Superhero Necromancer

John Barleycorn's Glen

2012-01-26T23:44:00.002-05:00

John Barleycorn’s Glen, a narrow vale between low moors, famed for its beers and whiskeys. In recent days, the spirits of this small land have begun to become strange and dark…

The Kingdom of Dust

2012-01-26T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Kingdom of Dust was a green, pleasant land, until the coming of the Master of the Desert Wind, who coveted its gentle breezes. It is now a parched wasteland of merciless dust storms.

The Blighted Rift

2012-01-24T21:54:00.000-05:00

One thing we're doing with the current campaign is that everyone is encouraged to create wilderness mini-regions of their own, and anyone can propose an expedition into one of those regions. If it's one of my regions, I GM. If it's one of your regions, you GM and I play.

The Blighted Rift is the first of what I expect will be many mini-regions from other members of my gaming circle. Credit goes to Andrew Devenney for this one. (He also has a column some folks might find interesting at Play the Past.)

The Blighted Rift, once a dwarven homeland of great wealth, this rift valley is now overrun with poisonous blight gas and undead rotters. The few dwarves remaining fight a hopeless battle to reclaim their homeland from the shambling dead, grimin scavengers, and a new evil emerging in the Frostfells.

There's just something special about D&D

2012-01-24T13:38:00.002-05:00

So this is completely obvious. But I'm going to say it anyway.

Generally speaking, D&D is the hobby. It is damned easy to find players. Also, in my experience, it is damned easy to find good players (by which I mean, people who are fun to game with). There are a lot of people to choose from, so a lot of them are fun to game with. It's the numbers.

I run an open table, and I use an email list with about a dozen names on it to announce weekly games. For about eight months last year, I ran a Mage: The Ascension game as the main campaign. One time we had eight players (I'm not counting myself in these counts). A number of times, we had five to six. Fairly often, we had four. But most weeks we had three players. Over the last few months of that campaign, we were consistently seeing the same three players making it to each session. They were the Mage audience.

Once Mage wrapped up, I pitched D&D. The email list lit up. Last week, we had eight. This week, having announced the game mere minutes ago, I'm already seeing the confirmation emails pouring in. I expect a good-sized group again.

One more thing to love about D&D.

Using the Wilderness Mini-Region Encounter Tables

2012-01-24T08:00:00.000-05:00

So, my 1-12 encounter tables on the one page region geomorphs (Example 1, Example 2, Example 3) work like this:

If the hex is a safe haven or civilized outpost or otherwise relatively safe place, roll 3d4 for encounters;
if it's borderlands, roll 2d6;
if it's dangerous wilderness, roll 1d12.

This can be modified for (e.g.) day versus night instead of civilized verses wilderness, or it could be used for levels of alertness of the local enemies or guards (3d4 if they're not paying attention, 2d6 if they're alert, and 1d12 if they are on high alert).

Then you just use your knowledge of where the peaks and impossible results are on the 3d4 and 2d6 rolls to your advantage when designing the table.

The 1-12 range is there for two reasons. One, it fits on the page without cramming things in; and two, it allows you to have some kind of coherent theme for the region. You have twelve entries to work with, so there will be repetition if the players spend much time in the region. This repetition is desirable. It sets a consistent backdrop for what the region is like.

The Slaughter at the Ruin Sea

2012-01-22T22:30:00.001-05:00

First, a litany of the dead.

This is the roll of adventurers who were cut down on the shores of the Ruin Sea by viking raven men with cold axes and no mercy for the dying.

Merrik, Ranger Prince of Dark Helm
Blimm Hollylock, Gnomish Necromancer
Rigorous Prawn, Weird-scarred Warrior
Solcoras Shaan Severin, Beast Triune of the Vaettir
Jari Scaleheart, Dwarven Paladin of the Coil

Why did the party provoke the raven men, though they were outnumbered two-to-one?

They needed a boat.

This did not deter the three survivors.

Reginald Tenement, Adventuring Consultant (inquire at 112 Baker's District)
Iqbal. AKA, Doctor Iqbal, Gnome Magician
Torg, Half-Orc Priest of the Sun (whose body Reginald Tenement dragged for some six hours until Torg awoke to consciousness and was able to heal himself)

The survivors went on to recruit five new allies, to venture into a dungeon on a cold, barren isle near the dragon's mountain (but not too near).

And so it was that the thief Lynn, the brawler Friar Monk, the mystery man Hideous Gleam, the half-orc soldier Uruz, and the warrior maiden Red Ailsa the Harlot joined the party.

And they all might have lived through the first few rooms of the dungeon, too, if Reginald Tenement had not insisted on walking into a black portal upon which he himself had read the words "The Door of Death." He had time to scream as the rot grubs devoured his body.

Also, there was:

cold-blooded murder,

corpse-robbery,

the throwing of a large rock at an animated statue,

something gaunt, with sharp fingers and fangs, waiting in a pit,

skeletons caught by surprise,

a door of life,
a wolf,

a lying boat captain.

And the paying of taxes.

Dungeons & Dragons -- that game where you never know what is going to happen.

The Spider Swamp

2012-01-18T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Spider Swamp was formerly a goblin hold, but the spiders rose up and cast off their former masters. Now the world belongs to the spiders, and the goblins are their slaves.

The Ruin Sea

2012-01-17T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Ruin Sea, formerly a wizard nation, inadvertently destroyed when a magical super weapon was detonated against the elves. Now inhabited by Ravenmen with Viking style culture.

The Dominion of the Snow Elves

2012-01-16T17:19:00.000-05:00

The Snow Elf Homeland, frozen tundra homeland of the expansionistic snow elves with their wolf and frost giant allies and orc soldiers and servants.

Wilderness Mini-Regions

2012-01-16T17:10:00.000-05:00

Campaign prep continues. We've broadened our horizons a bit, giving us a world with a lot of wilderness organized into small-ish (7x7 hex) regions that are basically wilderness geomorphs. The world is an eclectically magical one, so it's not a problem if you have the winter elves and their associated enemies and allies not too far from a desert full of Egyptian style gnomes (for example).

In any case, the upshot of this is that I've started developing wilderness mini-regions. Each is a more or less self contained unit that can be plopped down just about anywhere. I'll pre-assign them relative to each other as the game goes forward and we hear rumors. The players have been invited to develop their own home mini-regions using a template I've provided, so I'll be posting a few example templates over the next couple days.

These should be useful to folks beyond just my gaming group, as well. They need some tailoring for play. I have not included any secrets of the regions or pinned everything down. The first one is on its way.

The Fantasy Trip / GURPS Compatibility

2012-01-08T17:26:00.000-05:00

Anyone savvy with both The Fantasy Trip and GURPS?

I have a question, and it's probably better for a web forum but I'll ask it here first anyway. I like The Fantasy Trip quite a bit, and its Advanced Melee + Advanced Wizard + In the Labyrinth version is something of a sweet spot for me in terms of system-level complexity. I like a little complexity but not too much, and it's just about right for me.

Now, I know it's GURPS's ancestor, and I've looked at GURPS a bit, but I don't like GURPS's character creation, which is way too fiddly for my taste, and I also think TFT has a more flavorful magic system. I prefer it more or less in every way.

Anyway, I was talking with a friend about how interesting/desirable it would be to be able to associate certain magical traditions, uh, idioms let's say, to certain cultures, groups, even sects. I know GURPS has a lot of alternative ways to do magic, especially if you dig into GURPS Thaumatology.

How much work would it be to dip into Thaumatology for alternate magic systems, and (more importantly, actually) what would be the tricky bits, things to watch out for, things you could easily go horribly wrong with because they may appear analogous but aren't as analogous as one might expect?

The war in the north -- elves, dwarves, orcs, and men

2012-01-03T13:29:00.002-05:00

There is a war in the north.

No sudden, shocking invasion, nor great decisive battle that won a great empires. Not glorious war with renown to be gained. No, the slow grim march of decades of lost territories. Border skirmishes. Siege. Fallen forts. And always the growing cold.

For the invaders have time. They can afford to wait.

Elves are the shadow in the north. They first began taking our lands in my grandfather's time, bringing war with their servants and allies, the wolves and the frost giants.

Orcs are their soldiers. Using foul magics, they created orcs by combining goblins and men. Orcs are unnatural things, not of this world. They appear as men during the dark of night, walking among us with their wicked knives. The sun reveals them for what they truly are.

Goblins hate them as abominations and hate the elves for making them. Cruel, wanton, and often unpredictable, goblins are still man's greatest ally in the fight against the elves.

Halflings love comfort. They are collaborators, gladly trading with the elves and living in their newly conquered lands as good citizens. Not volunteers, mustering in the armies -- just quiet, simple folk. Good citizens who don't want trouble and are willing to look the other way when life gets uncomfortable for those who choose not to play along.

Dwarves wander through any land they must in pursuit of their obsessions -- gold and dragons. Dwarves emulate the dragons, worshipping them as gods and gathering hoards for their kingdoms. A great enough hoard will bring a dragon. It is said that in the greatest of dwarf halls, dragon kings sprawl on great glittering hoards, ruling as god kings under the mountain. Dwarf heroes who find dragons risk death stealing into their hoards to draw them to their own kingdoms.

Dragons are forces of nature -- powerful, ancient, and cunning. They do not speak. They do not think as men do. They are fiercely greedy.

This is a start. The idea for this campaign is not to stray too far from the classic D&D building blocks. Elves are still elves, dwarves are still dwarves, halflings are still hobbits. The blocks are just arranged in a slightly different way. These descriptions above are very brief and suggest monolithic groups, but in fact I'll be adding a lot of factions within each group as I develop the setting. Some lands conquered by the elves have adopted their ways. Human rulers and warlords may be in open war against the elves, may be acting as stewards of elf controlled lands, may be quietly plotting to retake their territories, and so on. Others have learned from the elves and are taking new lands of their own, without the elves' blessings, while some human warlords are simply taking advantage of the disorder to carve out territories of their own. Some have learned from the elves only to turn against them, fighting them back and taking back land once ruled by the elves themselves. Similarly, some elves work to oppose the conquest. Even some halflings have chosen to fight back.

There will be room for PCs to align themselves as they see fit.

Things to get lost in

2012-01-02T18:31:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year.

Like many other folks in my gaming circle, I've been swallowed whole by Skyrim. I only just got it a week ago, but it is... compelling. I agree with those who praise it for its ambition, which is impressive. I enjoy just walking the world, and the emergent quirkiness that sometimes develops from the random generation can be charming, funny, or just dangerous. I was in the middle of playing the new Zelda game when my brother gave me Skyrim as a gift. I'm a longtime Zelda fanatic who had never played an Elder Scrolls or Fallout game (I know, I know), but since Skyrim's arrival in my home, I have completely dropped Skyward Sword. I'll get back to it, of course. But I'm not sure when.

This post isn't really about Skyrim, but about what it inspires (to the extent that the post is about anything at all). What Skyrim inspires is interest in a hex crawl, somewhat west marches style game. We've had about a 6-8 month break from fantasy roleplay as our group has been engaged in a regular Mage: The Ascension campaign, albeit with a few one shots of other things mixed in -- a dash of rainy city D&D, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (2nd edition), Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game, and perhaps something else here or there. But it has been mostly a world changing Mage campaign in which everything appears to be coming to a head. It looks like the Mage game will wrap up in the near future.

A hex crawl, sandbox, pick-your-favorite-descriptor fantasy campaign is a likely follow up, and time permitting, when I can pull myself away from Skyrim, I'll be posting my thoughts on the initial setting ideas as well as the approach I'm taking to putting it all together.

Also, I assume you have seen Secret Santicore 2011. You have read it? It may be my favorite thing the OSR-osphere spun out in 2011. Having one person request something and another person produce it -- that really worked.

So, kudos to everyone involved in making that wonderful thing.

We have a fight booked. What do you think about that?

2011-11-13T12:18:00.001-05:00

Slowly working my way toward a set of tables to generate tournament situations for modern martial arts RPGs (esp. Street Fighter). This time, it's attitudes and history between fighters. I'd use this for NPCs, not PCs, since I prefer to have every PC fight happen in the game. These kinds of relationships develop on their own in play. Tournaments often require 8-16 NPCs, many of which will be new, so a table like this can be a useful springboard for play. Full table here, or in pdf format here.

Tell me about your Sensei

2011-10-30T16:22:00.003-04:00

Another update at my Street Fighter RPG blog. This time, it's a 1d100 table for generating facts about a PC or NPC's sensei. Should work for any relatively modern, pulpy game with martial arts, including supers.

The post is here, or go straight to the pdf.

Why do you fight?

2011-10-24T21:37:00.000-04:00

One hundred reasons people enter the street fighting circuit: pdf here, link to full post here.

Wizards of the Tower Cliffs

2011-10-20T18:53:00.000-04:00

Thewizards of the Tower Cliffs are a tightly knit community of egocentricmisanthropes thrust together by the need to have someone else around who mightcomprehend their greatness. They only have each other. Whenever two wizardscome together, roll once for each to see what their history and relationshipsare like.

1d20
1. is envious of the (1-3) status or (4-6) skill of...
2. has unknowingly offended...
3. has purposefully offended...
4. has been spying on...
5. has been sleeping with (1-5) apprentice of, (6-7) lover
of, (8-9) spouse of, (10) the wizard him/herself
6. has stolen from...
7. covets the spellbook or magic item of...
8. secretly admires...
9. has betrayed...
10. is an old friend of...
11. has been trying to murder...
12. is the former apprentice of...
13. has stolen an apprentice from...
14. is a (1) friendly (2-6) bitter rival of...
15. is (1-3) openly (4-6) privately dismissive of the work
of...
16. is a former co-apprentice (they studied under the same
master) of...
17. owes...
18. is plotting together with... against...
19. is plotting against... with...
20. became famous through a brutal critique of the
scholarship of...

PDF

Inspired by Aristocrat relationships on p. 47 of Vornheim.

1000 Traits

2011-10-19T18:28:00.000-04:00

Just a quick table with 1000 personality traits, attitudes, reputations, and so on for use in generating a little character for off-the-cuff NPCs. Results were culled from tables I had laying around and web searches for personality traits.

Roll 2-3 times on the table. Sometimes, there's a contradiction -- you can discard it or just roll with it (people are complicated). We've used this kind of table to generate NPCs that players were going to run, like hirelings, locals, and so on. Usually you know when you've reached the point where you have a trait or two that you can work with. Stop at that point -- the next roll is tempting, but it usually doesn't add much.

Here's a pdf. Here's a plain text copy to make custom tables easier to put together. The full list is included after the jump.

1000 characteristics, reputations, and personality traits
1. abandoned
2. abrasive
3. absent-minded
4. absorbed in ideas
5. abusive
6. accepting
7. accident-prone
8. accommodating
9. accomplished
10. active
11. adamant
12. adaptable
13. adaptive
14. adequate
15. adulterer
16. adventurous
17. aesthetic
18. affable
19. affectionate
20. affiliative
21. afraid
22. afraid of ghosts
23. agreeable
24. aggressive
25. agnostic
26. agonized
27. agreeable
28. alcoholic
29. alert
30. aloof
31. amateurish demeanor
32. ambitious
33. ambivalent
34. amiable
35. amicable
36. amusing
37. analytical
38. angry
39. animated
40. annoyed
41. antagonistic
42. anti-intellectual
43. antisocial
44. anxious
45. apathetic
46. apologetic
47. appreciative
48. apprehensive
49. approachable
50. arbitrary
51. argumentative
52. aristocratic
53. arrogant
54. art collector
55. articulate
56. artistic
57. artless
58. aspiring
59. assertive
60. astonished
61. astounded
62. astute
63. attentive
64. attentive to others
65. audacious
66. authoritarian
67. authoritative
68. autocratic
69. avoids conflict
70. aware of own limitations
71. awed
72. backstabber
73. beautiful
74. belligerent
75. benevolent
76. betrayed
77. bewildered
78. bewitching
79. bitter
80. blames others for problems
81. blasé
82. blissful
83. boastful
84. boisterous
85. bold
86. boorish
87. bored
88. bossy
89. bragging
90. brave
91. brazen
92. bright
93. brilliant
94. broad-minded
95. bully
96. burdened
97. busy
98. calculating
99. callous
100. calm
101. candid
102. capable
103. captivated
104. carefree
105. careful
106. careless
107. careless of social rules
108. caring
109. caustic
110. cautious
111. challenged
112. charismatic
113. charitable
114. charming
115. chaste
116. chatty
117. cheat
118. cheerful
119. childish
120. classy
121. clean
122. clever
123. closed
124. clumsy
125. coarse
126. cocky
127. cold
128. cold-hearted
129. combative
130. compassionate
131. competitive
132. complacent
133. compliant
134. composed
135. compulsive
136. compulsive liar
137. conceited
138. concerned
139. concrete thinking
140. condemned
141. condescending
142. confident
143. conformist
144. confused
145. congenial
146. connoisseur of good drink
147. connoisseur of good food
148. conscientious
149. conservative
150. considerate
151. consistent
152. conspicuous
153. conspiracy theorist
154. constructive
155. contented
156. contrary
157. contrite
158. controlling
159. conventional
160. cool
161. cooperative
162. cosmopolitan
163. courageous
164. courteous
165. covetous
166. cowardly
167. crafty
168. cranky
169. creative
170. critical
171. cross
172. crude
173. cruel
174. crushed
175. culpable
176. cultured
177. cunning
178. curious
179. cynical
180. dainty
181. dangerous
182. daredevil
183. daring
184. dashing
185. dauntless
186. debonair
187. deceitful
188. decent
189. decisive
190. dedicated
191. defeated
192. deferential
193. defiant
194. delegates authority
195. deliberative
196. delicate
197. delighted
198. delusional about own skills
199. dependable
200. dependent
201. depraved
202. depressive
203. desirous
204. despairing
205. despicable
206. destructive
207. detached
208. detail-oriented
209. determined
210. develops close friendships
211. devout
212. dictatorial
213. diffident
214. dignified
215. diligent
216. diminished
217. diplomatic
218. direct
219. directionless
220. dirty
221. discerning
222. disciplined
223. discouraged
224. discreet
225. diseased
226. dishonest
227. disloyal
228. dismayed
229. disorganized
230. disparaging
231. disregards rules
232. disrespectful
233. dissatisfied
234. dissident
235. distant
236. distracted
237. distraught
238. distressed
239. distrustful
240. disturbed
241. divided
242. docile
243. does what is convenient
244. does what is necessary or right
245. dogmatic
246. dominant
247. domineering
248. doubtful
249. dowdy
250. downtrodden
251. dramatic
252. driven
253. drug addict
254. drunk
255. dubious
256. dull
257. dumb
258. dutiful
259. dynamic
260. eager
261. easily embarrassed
262. easily led
263. easily upset
264. easy
265. easy-going
266. eccentric
267. ecstatic
268. educated
269. efficient
270. egocentric
271. egotistical
272. electrified
273. eloquent
274. elusive
275. embittered
276. embraces change
277. emotional
278. emotionally stable
279. empathetic
280. empty
281. enchanted
282. encouraging
283. energetic
284. enigmatic
285. enjoys a good argument
286. enjoys a good brawl
287. enjoys a little friendly competition
288. enterprising
289. enthusiastic
290. entrepreneurial
291. envious
292. erratic
293. evil
294. exacting
295. exasperated
296. excessive
297. excitable
298. excited
299. exhausted
300. expedient
301. experimental
302. expert
303. expressive
304. extravagant
305. extraverted
306. exuberant
307. faces reality
308. facetious
309. failure
310. fair
311. faith in oneself
312. faith in others
313. faithful
314. fanatical
315. fanciful
316. fascinated
317. fast learner
318. fastidious
319. fatalistic
320. fatigued
321. fawning
322. fearful
323. fearless
324. feisty
325. fidgety
326. fierce
327. finicky
328. fitness fanatic
329. flamboyant
330. flexible
331. flippant
332. flirtatious
333. flustered
334. focused
335. follower
336. follows rules
337. foolhardy
338. foolish
339. forceful
340. forgiving
341. formal
342. forthright
343. fortunate
344. fragile
345. fragmented
346. frank
347. frazzled
348. free of guilt
349. free thinking
350. friendly
351. frightened
352. frigid
353. frugal
354. frustrated
355. fun to be around
356. fun-loving
357. funny
358. furious
359. garrulous
360. gaudy
361. generous
362. gentle
363. genuine
364. giddy
365. gives others their freedom
366. giving
367. glad
368. glamorous
369. gloomy
370. glum
371. glutton
372. gluttonous
373. good
374. good communicator
375. good listener
376. good-natured
377. good-spirited
378. graceful
379. gracious
380. grandiose
381. grateful
382. gratified
383. greedy
384. gregarious
385. grief
386. groovy
387. grotesque
388. grouchy
389. grounded
390. group-oriented
391. grumpy
392. guarded
393. guileless
394. guilt prone
395. guilty
396. gullible
397. haggard
398. happy
399. happy go lucky
400. hardworking
401. hardy
402. harried
403. harsh
404. has a vision for the future
405. has a weak constitution
406. has achieved many things in life
407. has clear goals
408. has good taste
409. hasn't achieved much in life
410. hassled
411. hateful
412. haughty
413. haunted by a ghost
414. heartbroken
415. heavenly
416. helpful
417. helpless
418. heroic
419. hesitant
420. high
421. high energy
422. high self-esteem
423. high social status
424. hobbyist
425. holy
426. homesick
427. honest
428. honorable
429. hopeful
430. hopeless
431. hospitable
432. humble
433. humorous
434. hypocritical
435. hysterical
436. ignorant
437. ignored
438. ill-bred
439. ill-will
440. imaginative
441. immaculate
442. immature
443. immodest
444. impartial
445. impatient
446. impeccable
447. impersonal
448. impolite
449. impoverished
450. impractical
451. impressed
452. improves self
453. impudent
454. impulsive
455. in harmony
456. inactive
457. incoherent
458. incompetent
459. inconsiderate
460. indecisive
461. independent
462. indifferent
463. indiscreet
464. individualistic
465. indulgent
466. industrious
467. inept
468. infantile
469. infatuated
470. informed
471. infuriated
472. inherited success
473. inhibited
474. inhumane
475. innocent
476. inquisitive
477. insane
478. insecure
479. insensitive
480. insightful
481. insipid
482. insistent
483. insolent
484. insouciant
485. inspired
486. insulting
487. intellectual
488. intelligent
489. interested
490. intimidated
491. intimidating
492. intolerant
493. intrepid
494. introspective
495. introverted
496. intuitive
497. inventive
498. involved
499. irresponsible
500. irreverent
501. irritable
502. isolated
503. jealous
504. jovial
505. joyous
506. judgmental
507. jumpy
508. just
509. keen
510. kind
511. knowledgeable
512. lackadaisical
513. laconic
514. languid
515. lascivious
516. lax
517. lazy
518. leaves things unfinished
519. lecherous
520. lethargic
521. liberal
522. licentious
523. likes people
524. lively
525. logical
526. lonely
527. longing
528. loquacious
529. love
530. lover, not a fighter
531. loving
532. low drive
533. low social status
534. loyal
535. loyal to boss
536. loyal to community
537. loyal to family
538. loyal to friends
539. lucky
540. lusty
541. macho
542. megalomaniac
543. malevolent
544. malicious
545. maniacal
546. manic
547. manipulative
548. mannered
549. masochistic
550. materialistic
551. mature
552. maudlin
553. mean
554. mean-spirited
555. melancholy
556. melodramatic
557. merciful
558. messy
559. meticulous
560. mischievous
561. miserable
562. miserly
563. modest
564. moody
565. moralistic
566. morbid
567. motivated
568. muddled goals
569. murderer
570. mysterious
571. mystical
572. naïve
573. narcissistic
574. nasty
575. natural leader
576. naughty
577. negligent
578. nervous
579. never gives up in the face of difficulty
580. nice
581. no-nonsense
582. noble
583. noisy
584. non-committing
585. nonchalant
586. nonconforming
587. nostalgic
588. obedient
589. obliging
590. oblivious
591. obnoxious
592. obscene
593. obsequious
594. observant
595. obsessed
596. obsessive about something
597. obstinate
598. open
599. open to change
600. open-minded
601. opinionated
602. opportunistic
603. oppositional
604. optimistic
605. organized
606. ornery
607. ostentatious
608. others can't be relied on
609. outgoing
610. outraged
611. outspoken
612. over wrought
613. overbearing
614. overconfident
615. overwhelmed
616. pampered
617. panicked
618. paranoid
619. participating
620. passionate
621. passive
622. patient
623. peaceful
624. pensive
625. perceptive
626. perfectionist
627. persecuted
628. persevering
629. persistent
630. personable
631. persuasive
632. pert
633. perverted
634. pessimistic
635. petrified
636. petty
637. petulant
638. philanthropic
639. picky
640. pious
641. pity
642. placid
643. pleasant
644. pleased
645. polished
646. polite
647. pompous
648. poor communicator
649. poor listener
650. popular
651. positive
652. possessed by a demon or evil spirit
653. power-hungry
654. practical
655. precise
656. pressured
657. presumptuous
658. pretentious
659. pretty
660. prim
661. private
662. productive
663. profane
664. professional demeanor
665. promiscuous
666. prosaic
667. prosperous
668. proud
669. prudent
670. psychopath
671. punctilious
672. punctual
673. pushy
674. puzzled
675. quarrelsome
676. quick
677. quiet
678. quirky
679. quitter
680. quixotic
681. radical
682. raging
683. rambunctious
684. rapturous
685. rash
686. rational
687. reactionary
688. realistic
689. reasonable
690. reasoning
691. rebellious
692. reckless
693. reclusive
694. refined
695. refreshed
696. rejected
697. rejects change
698. relaxed
699. relentless
700. reliable
701. relieved
702. religious
703. remorseful
704. remote
705. resentful
706. reserved
707. resilient
708. resolute
709. resourceful
710. respected in the community
711. respectful
712. respects experience
713. respects traditional ideas
714. responsible
715. restless
716. restrained
717. results-oriented
718. retiring
719. reverent
720. rewarded
721. righteous
722. rigid
723. risk averse
724. risk-taking
725. robust and healthy
726. rogue
727. romantic
728. rough
729. rowdy
730. rude
731. rule-bound
732. rule-conscious
733. ruthless
734. sad
735. sadistic
736. safe
737. saintly
738. sarcastic
739. sassy
740. satisfied
741. savvy
742. scared
743. scornful
744. screwed up
745. secretive
746. secure
747. sedate
748. seditious
749. sees the big picture
750. self-absorbed
751. self-assured
752. self-blaming
753. self-centered
754. self-confident
755. self-conscious
756. self-deprecating
757. self-directed
758. self-disciplined
759. self-doubting
760. self-effacing
761. self-indulgent
762. self-made
763. self-reliant
764. self-righteous
765. self-satisfied
766. self-sufficient
767. selfish
768. selfless
769. sense of duty
770. sensitive
771. sensual
772. sentimental
773. serene
774. serious
775. servile
776. settled
777. sexy
778. shallow
779. sheepish
780. shifty
781. shocked
782. short-tempered
783. shows initiative
784. shrewd
785. shy
786. silent
787. silly
788. simple
789. simple-minded
790. sincere
791. skeptical
792. skillful
793. sleazy
794. sloppy
795. slovenly
796. sluggish
797. sly
798. smart
799. sneaky
800. snobbish
801. sociable
802. socially bold
803. socially precise
804. soft
805. soft-spoken
806. solemn
807. solitary
808. solution-oriented
809. sophisticated
810. sorrowful
811. sour
812. spendthrift
813. spiritual
814. spiteful
815. spoiled
816. spontaneous
817. sports fan
818. squeamish
819. staid
820. startled
821. steadfast
822. steady
823. stern
824. stingy
825. stoic
826. stolid
827. straight-laced
828. straightforward
829. strange
830. stress free
831. stressed out
832. strict
833. strong nerves
834. stubborn
835. studious
836. stunned
837. stupefied
838. stupid
839. suave
840. submissive
841. subtle
842. successful in school
843. successful in work
844. suffering
845. sullen
846. supercilious
847. superstitious
848. supportive
849. sure
850. surly
851. suspicious
852. suspicious of strangers
853. sweet
854. sycophantic
855. sympathetic
856. taciturn
857. tactful
858. takes responsibility
859. talented
860. talkative
861. tasteful
862. telepathic
863. temperamental
864. temperate
865. tempted
866. tenacious
867. tender minded
868. tense
869. tentative
870. tenuous
871. terrible
872. terrified
873. thankful
874. thick skinned
875. thief
876. thoughtful
877. thoughtless
878. threatened
879. thrifty
880. thrillseeker
881. thwarted
882. time driven
883. timid
884. tired
885. tireless
886. toadying
887. tolerant
888. tolerates disorder
889. torpid
890. touchy
891. tough
892. tough-minded
893. traditional
894. traitorous
895. tranquil
896. treacherous
897. treasonous
898. tricky
899. tries to do everything
900. trivial
901. troubled
902. trusting
903. trustworthy
904. truthful
905. tyrannical
906. ugly
907. unapproachable
908. unassuming
909. unaware of own limitations
910. unclean
911. uncommunicative
912. unconditional
913. uncontrolled
914. unconventional
915. uncooperative
916. uncouth
917. undisciplined
918. uneasy
919. uneducated
920. unexacting
921. unfocused
922. unforgiving
923. unfriendly
924. ungrateful
925. unhelpful
926. uninhibited
927. unkind
928. unlucky
929. unmotivated
930. unprejudiced
931. unpretentious
932. unreasonable
933. unreliable
934. unruly
935. unscrupulous
936. unselfish
937. unsentimental
938. unsettled
939. unshakeable
940. unsuspecting
941. unsuspicious
942. unsympathetic
943. unworried
944. upset
945. useful
946. utilitarian
947. vain
948. valiant
949. valorous
950. values fair competition
951. values family
952. values hard work
953. values honesty
954. values material possessions
955. values money
956. values religion
957. vehement
958. vengeful
959. venturesome
960. verbose
961. versatile
962. veteran
963. vicious
964. vigilant
965. vindictive
966. violent
967. virtuous
968. vital
969. vivacious
970. vulgar
971. vulnerable
972. wanton
973. warlike
974. warm
975. warm-hearted
976. wary
977. wasteful
978. watchful
979. weak
980. weak nerves
981. wealthy
982. weepy
983. welcoming
984. well-groomed
985. whimsical
986. wholesome
987. wicked
988. willful
989. willpower
990. wise
991. withdrawn
992. witty
993. wonderful
994. works well under pressure
995. worldly
996. worried
997. worrying
998. worshipful
999. worships the devil
1000. zealous

A Ruined Castle of Aventurien

2011-09-05T10:48:00.003-04:00

Another map courtesy of Das Schwarze Auge, in this case, a ruined keep on the water. I imagine the keep above plagued by skeletons and the ghosts, rats and ravens. The dungeons below waterlogged, home to more skeletons, as well as bullywugs and troglodytes, slimes and oozes.

Bellringer's Day

2011-09-03T12:08:00.003-04:00

On new year's day, the streets of the rainy city are filled with the ringing of bells.

It is a well-known fact that the ringing of bells drives away evil spirits, fairies, and storms, and the custom of ringing the bells to sound in a new year is an ancient tradition of the city. The ringing begins in the dim grey dawn and lasts throughout the dim grey day until the dusk returns the city to darkness and quiet.

There is not a moment in the day when somewhere bells are not ringing.

Bells are sold on every street corner in Old Town in the days leading up to the holiday, and children rise early with their families on Bellringer's Morn to ring in the day. New bells are said to bring good luck, and it is true that lucky children have parents who can afford to buy new bells for the holiday. No labor is done on Bellringer's Day, except that which profits the people food and drink. Bells are fastened to carriages in the Mids and Embassy Row and to boats and ships' masts in Harboursides. All church doors stand open with a bellringer by the door. The city's gargoyles flock in Old Town, hanging thick as bats to the outer walls of the Alchemists' Guild and Opera House, ringing the bells they hold in their teeth.

In the Mids, youths attach bells to kites, flying them as high as they can in the storm. Their mothers affix tiny bells to their cloaks and hang them from tea cups. Messengers secure bells to their boots. Barkeeps keep a gong next to the tap, clanging it each time they pull a pint. Bell races are held on the waters of the murk, as the ferrymen navigate the guide posts in the bay as fast as they can without allowing the bells on their barges to ring. Tower Cliffs wizards send their apprentices, and the occasional bound demon, to walk the streets of the city ringing sigil-engraved bells while proclaiming that evil and rain shall be banished in their master's name.

And, of course, everyone attaches bells to their umbrellas.

In the gloom before dusk, the ten thousand mystery cults and fraternal brotherhoods of Levee Town emerge to walk the city in their full ceremonial regalia, bells in hand, fervently praying to drive the storm away. Some cults march in solemn procession. Others dash naked and screaming through the streets. The townsfolk fill the streets to watch the cults promenade.

At nightfall, it is time for the Clamor. Every bell in the city is rung, from the lowly Sump to the high Tower Cliffs, until the din builds to a crescendo.

As darkness settles in, so does the quiet. The people of the city retire to their dining rooms for their Bellringer's Night Dinners. And for one more year of rain.

Six Villages of Aventurien

2011-09-01T19:12:00.000-04:00

I've never played a Das Schwarze Auge, but two DSA books I picked up a few years ago have served me very well in Warhammer FRP and D&D games alike. The books are collections of 1-3 page location descriptions with very nice hand-drawn maps of common buildings, from shops and smithies to castles, and they show nice attention to authenticity. The image to the left, of 6 village layouts, is typical, and I've used some of these villages as central places in a small, regional Warhammer campaign. The players from that game know these villages well.

I'm not aware of any available source for these in markets outside Germany. The two softcover books I originally picked up have been collected in a hardcover and are available in German markets under the title Ritterburgen & Spelunken. I can heartily recommend this particular book for map fans, even if you don't speak German. They're part of a larger series of similarly marketed books, of which I also have the dungeon guide and guide to magical academies. Some books in this line diverge from the hand drawn style of the earlier books, to their detriment. I'll be posting a few of my favorite (or most used) maps from these books in the near future.

And, it goes without saying, I'm happy to remove them if requested by the rights holder.

Monsters, from symbolic beasts to natural animals

2011-08-26T21:49:00.001-04:00

Monster Manuals are not the first time people have built elaborate taxonomies of the monstrous. The medieval bestiary (also not the first on the job, but well ahead of the monster manual) presents us with an earlier example of the cataloging and categorizing of monsters and animals and all their features. Take a look at a medieval bestiary, the source (albeit often mediated by literature) of some of D&D's core monsters. The urge to catalog, to categorize, to create a taxonomy, to explain -- the creative and exploratory instincts of man -- are on full display. But the results are very different than those of the modern monster manual.

In OD&D and throughout some of the life of 1st edition, monsters were, broadly speaking, things that you meet. You encounter them. Some of them will talk. Some will fight. Some will chase you. Others want to be left alone. Some are puzzles. Some are traps. Some are dirty tricks Gary came up with to punish you for rummaging around in corpses or listening at doors. Their roles are varied, except that they are out there, some sitting in rooms or living in lairs, some wandering about, but all there to be encountered, if you're in the right place at the right time.

Somewhere by the end of 1st edition, monsters were already taking on a life of their own beyond the encounter. Ecological naturalism was taking over, and monsters were increasingly becoming races and beings that lived and loved and died, with or without you. By this time, it doesn't raise an eyebrow to talk about the "typical" minotaur or "typical" medusa, or typical anything (pretty much): beings which were originally uniquely monstrous (or very nearly so) had become species. No more or less natural (within a magical world) than a dog or a cat. Monsters by convention, but essentially ordinary.

By 3rd edition many monsters were ready for a bit of reinvention: both the new art direction and in some cases the new stats gave us new angles on old monsters, or at least more consistent stats for the monstrous, with reduced information about ecology and lifestyle but no major changes. By 4th edition, consistency within the game rules was taking over, and it was time to reinvent and reimagine monsters once again. One part of this was the attempt to make the monster trademarkable and copyrightable and ownable. The monster needed to become intellectual property, something owned by Wizards of the Coast and by extension Hasbro. The Flame Blitz Shadow Orc isn't the result of Wizards's tin ear. It's a business move. Alongside this came another move, with the goal to reinvent the monsters, systematize them in a new overarching story/context (with primordials and titans), and in some ways an attempt to make the monster a monster again.

Unfortunately, 4th edition missed the mark on monsters. The 4e monster is not something that exists separately from the PCs, as was the monster of 2nd edition. And it is not even something that exists to be met, to be encountered, as it had been earlier yet. Rather, the monster is something to be fought. You don't encounter a 4th edition monster, you fight it. It does not frighten you, it does not chase you, it is not hiding under your bed. It may be a puzzle on some level, but it is mainly a combat puzzle. A monster is something you fight.

There's something right about that, the fighting monsters part. That is one of the things you do with monsters in myth and legend. But that isn't everything you do with them, even if you're a hero, and it certainly isn't everything you would have done with them in early D&D.

So modern D&D has the monster as natural animal (which reached its pinnacle in 2nd edition) and the monster as abstract combat challenge, a fighting algorithm, a sequence of attacks ticking away on a timer we call Hit Points. (Fixing the monster, in 4th edition, has mostly resolved around getting the timer to tick at the appropriate pace.)

What about the monster of the medieval bestiary? The bestiary too shares the D&D monster manual's concern with taxonomy. But what a different taxonomy it is! In the monster manual, the term "monster" eventually becomes a misnomer: "beast" would sometimes be better. In a great many cases, "animal," or "creature," would work just as well. The monster manual monster is not something that is wrong with the world. It is not something that does not belong here. It is not even something that is particularly unique or interesting, though there are plenty of wonderful examples where at least the D&D monster remains bizarre. But it remains something that we can classify, categorize, and taxonomize in a fairly naturalistic way. It can be explained. It has an ecological niche. It belongs in the world it inhabits. It is not symbolic. It does not carry a heavy handed moral, it does not stand in as a crude allegory for God or the Devil or sin or the sinner or redemption. It would not live long in a C.S. Lewis tale, and it would it live long in a medieval bestiary. The medieval beast is a creature of symbolism. In a bestiary, even a mundane animal, even a common, everyday, banal creature such as a mouse or an ant is something more. It is a symbol, a story, a little piece of Christianity and morality, of right and wrong, of spiritual warfare and the secret history of the world.

In the medieval bestiary, the even the most mundane of animals is made into a symbol. In the monster manual, even the most bizarre of monsters is made into a animal.

The Knockers Guild

2011-08-16T21:48:00.001-04:00

The Knockers Guild is a fraternal order of dwarves, goblins, buccas, kobolds, gnomes and other earth elves who have banded together to help a fellow out, make a little extra gold, and have a little fun by the by. Any grubby, ugly little man who lives in a mine or dungeon, and has a little good in his heart, might join. The Knockers walk the halls of the deepest megadungeons, tapping on the floor as they go with the distinctive silver-blue knocker's lanterns they use to light the way for travelers. Meeting a knocker is generally a good thing, though it can be bewildering -- their logic isn't always logical by surface standards. Knockers have been known to mention trivial dangers like a handful of greedy goblins while ignoring very big things like a dragon -- which really is very obvious, so why would anyone need to mention it? They've been known to charge small sums for maps to very large treasures, or vice versa. Some will treat you like a long lost friend the first time they meet you. Others you've met before might walk right by without even an offer of assistance.

When you meet a knocker, he always has the silver-blue lantern that signals his membership in the guild. He will never part with it, and its light will go out forever if he dies or it is taken from him.

He also has one of the following things to share (Roll 1d6).

1. Local Map: The knocker has (or is willing to sketch up on the spot) a map of some of the local areas of the dungeon. He doesn't need it (he has a natural sense for which way to go underground, you see), but he's happy to part with it. If there are monsters in the rooms that he knows about, or other major features, he might mention those too.

2. Treasure Map: The knocker has or is willing to sketch up a map to the nearest treasure cache he knows about. He may also tell you about guardian monsters.

3. Naturalists Sketches of Wandering Monsters: Roll 1d6 times on your wandering monster tables. The knocker can tell you that these monsters are wandering about the halls. Feel free to liven up the gossip about each monster -- who or what do they like to eat, who do they hate in the dungeon, and who do they pal around with.

4. Cakes and Wine: He has good cakes and fine wine, enough to refresh 1d6 adventurers. Each adventurer who partakes in the cakes and wine will regain 1d6 hit points. Of course, you've also just accepted food from a fairy. Which may or may not mean something some day down the road.

5. Knocker Weed: The knocker carries good pipe weed to share. Taking a pull from the pipe grants the character infravision 60' for the next 2d6 turns.

6. The Key: The key opens any locked door in the dungeon. It must be rapped solidly against the door, at which point it makes a loud knocking sound and the door swings open. Each time the key is used, roll one die. On an odd roll, that was the last charge, and the key loses its ability to open future doors (don't tell the players until they try to use it again, at which point it vanishes loudly when used to knock). On an even roll, the key retains its charge. Any time the key is used, roll a wandering monster check due to the noise.

No goods or services are free, of course. That would be very bad luck. But the price of any given item will depend on your reaction check. On a positive reaction roll, goods and services cost a few copper pennies. On a negative reaction roll, it's gold and maybe even jewels -- the price will be higher the deeper your pockets are, and the deeper your need. On a very negative roll, the knocker might ask for something personal -- a treasured possession, a lock of hair, or even a debt. This may be harmless, and often is. But sometime in the future the knocker may come calling for a returned favor.

Needless to say, if you deal badly with the knockers, they will deal badly with you.

Superhero Necromancer Summer (also Google+)

2011-08-14T15:04:00.001-04:00

We all have other hobbies in addition to good ol' D&D. One of mine is trail running. This summer I took part in the Great Lakes Relay in Northern Michigan for the second time, and I made it out to Wisconsin for a Tough Mudder event (my first one). Both were a hell of a lot of fun.

Our Great Lakes Relay team was short a few runners, so we ended up all logging extra miles. I covered 35 miles of trails in the three days of the race.

(More pictures behind the link.)

The Wisconsin Tough Mudder course was a ten mile event. Obstacle 19 ("Everest") was a bastard for me to get to the top of, but everything else went smoothly. Here I am at Obstacle 5 ("The Funky Monkey"), which was right up my alley.

I'm settling back in for the fall now, and I may be able to get into some of the Google+ games. Just follow the photo galleries or this link if you want to find me there.

Further (intermittent) gaming content will resume again in the near future.

Vornheim is very good

2011-07-06T15:53:00.000-04:00

I am not at all sure why it took me so long to buy Vornheim. Our D&D campaign is set in a city, after all.

I can use nearly everything in Vornheim at the table in the rainy city.

Especially,

The Immortal Zoo of Ping Feng: I have some scattered notes for adding a zoo to the rainy city. Ping Feng's zoo is better. Also, it is ready to run, rather than being just some scattered notes. I can drop a "living" version of it straight into my game.
The Library of Zorlac: Again, this place will fit right into my town with no changes. It is interesting, atmospheric, and eminently gameable. Also, the random books table on page 49 is the kind of table I should have made a long time ago considering how many books have been looted in our campaign. And the rules for libraries on p. 41, as well. Zak, thank you for these. Combined with Chris Pound's Dying Earth Spell Generator, I'm much better prepared for dealing with books both arcane and mundane in an interesting fashion.
The floorplan shortcut: Ingenious. I often need floorplans for break-ins. For more complex manses, I have printouts of floor plans from here. For simpler domiciles of the well-to-do, I have relied heavily on Georgian townhouse layouts. Both require having things printed up and ready to use, which I usually can manage. But this little shortcut will add variety and simplicity when I need floorplans in the moment. It is one of many clever, useful shortcuts in the book that I'll be able to use directly. There's a lot of ingenuity on display in Vornheim's approach to on-the-fly city generation and play, and the floorplan shortcut is just one of many examples.
The tables: Everyone loves these. I do too. I'll be filling the ranks of Embassy Row from the aristocrats table. And then there are the tables for city NPCs, for shopkeepers, for contacts, for connections between NPCs, for encounters, for searching the body, and for magic effects. All useful, all atmospheric, and all with gameability.

This is a damned good game book. Even the first part of the book, which presents Vornheim itself, is full of material that can be directly incorporated into any city campaign. The whole book lives up to the subtitle ("The Complete City Kit"), not just the ingenious shortcuts and excellent tables.

I haven't actually used very much published OSR stuff at the game table directly. Our rainy city adventures have been played using either the D&D Rules Cyclopedia or The Fantasy Trip, so I haven't needed retro-clones. Other than my rulebook and my own notes and printouts, the only other stuff I've actually used so far in the campaign are Jason Alexander's Halls of the Mad Mage and Jeff Rients's Miscellaneum of Cinder. Vornheim goes straight into the gaming bag for future rainy city sessions.

AD&D Character Sheets with a DiTerlizzi Touch

2011-07-05T14:53:00.000-04:00

Tony DiTerlizzi has just shared some a nice set of illustrated AD&D character sheets at his blog, for those who are interested.

See the end of this post for the sheets (an elven fighter, elven mage, half-orc, halfling thief, human fighter, human cleric, and human thief).

If you don't understand wargaming, you shouldn't be a D&D designer

2011-07-01T14:40:00.001-04:00

Or, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." -- "wargame" edition.

This is not a new idea, just my take of something plenty of other people have said in their own ways. It comes with caveats. I'm talking about D&D, not other RPGs. Also, not really talking about homebrewing and hobby culture as a whole. If you're working on something for D&D, do what you like, and all that. I'm thinking about the paid professionals who have the (admittedly often thankless) responsibility of husbanding Dungeons & Dragons.

The simple version is this. The designers of D&D need to understand wargaming. Otherwise they are poorly suited to work on D&D. By wargaming, I don't mean they need to understand the mechanics or rules sets of a large number of wargames in great detail, though cross fertilization is a fine thing. I mean wargaming as a phenomenon, including how wargamers think about what they're doing. Not all minis games are part of wargaming culture, and a lot of popular tabletop strategy games don't count. Click-based tabletop games, for example, are generally more akin to CCG's in terms of their cultures of play. Their cultures of play are rule-oriented and reward rule-oriented cleverness and playing to win. Wargames aren't like this, a point I'll come back to. I don't know about Warhammer or 40K or similar major minis games, but I suspect they're outside wargaming culture. It's easy to lump all "wargames" and "competitive tabletop games" together (as M. Tresca does, very badly, in his recent book). These games all include head-to-head competitive engagements, after all. But they're not all competitive in the same ways, and the ways they differ as competitions turn out to matter quite a lot.

CCGs and click-based games have a competition culture more in common with that of head-to-head video games than with wargaming. I'll use Street Fighter as my point of reference for how competition works in video games, since it's a game I know a bit about. Also, I can let someone better than me explain it.

Here's how you play Street Fighter.

You play to win.

Sirlin spells it out here: Part I, Part II, Part III (To see the culture in action, start here or here and work outward).

In competitive video games, you play to win. That means the game rules are what they are and you apply cleverness and skill to the task of winning using all available means. In CCGs, you get a similar effect. The rules are interpreted legalistically. They don't model anything but themselves. You win by applying cleverness and skill within the rules set. There is no essential fictional component to gameplay. Dungeons and Dragons has moved toward this type of approach, as noted (to choose a prominent example) in Justin Alexander's "Dissociated Mechanics" essay.

In this respect, modern D&D is very different from wargaming, in spite of the superficial fact that miniatures are an important component of most wargames as well as modern D&D. Wargaming isn't found in the use of minis and rulers or hex maps and so on. Indeed, the move from wargames to D&D is not particularly surprising when real wargaming is taken into account. In wargaming, fictional content does affect gameplay. Dissociated mechanics are antithetical to wargaming in general, not just to RPGs.

Bob Cordery summed up a few basic principles for wargaming design (and, in fact, for wargaming play as well) in a recent post at Wargaming Miscellany. I'll repeat them here in brief, but I'd encourage you to read the post for more explanation.

Fred T Jane’s ‘Reality’ or ‘Primary Rule of Wargaming’
‘Nothing can be done contrary to what could or would be done in actual war.’

Golf’s ‘Spirit of the Game’
‘Wargames are played, for the most part, without the supervision of an umpire. The game relies on the integrity of the individual players to show consideration for other players and to abide by the rules. All players should conduct themselves in a disciplined manner, demonstrating courtesy and sportsmanship at all times, irrespective of how competitive they may be. This is the spirit of the wargame.’

Joseph Morschauser’s ‘Dice’ ruleJoseph Morschauser had a simple rule for adjudicating events that were not covered by a specific rule. It states:

‘Let the dice decide!’

Probably best to just read Bob Cordry's post. It isn't long!

I am not in fact a heavy wargamer (half a year of regular attendance at the Leeds Wargames club and miscellaneous other play outside that), but Cordery's principles were immediately recognizable to me. They described a lot of what I saw at the club. They are also strikingly at odds with Sirlin's "Play to Win" philosophy as well as the general philosophy of play in CCGs and many other competitive games, a philosophy that is often applied to modern Dungeons & Dragons. Under the broad umbrella of "competition," it's very easy to conflate these approaches, and I've seen them confused more times than I can count. Each approach has its merits, and I happen to enjoy both. Still, it's important that the designers of D&D have a clear understanding of how they differ, and I'm not always sure that they do. Furthermore, confusions about how wargames work is common in online discussions about the relationship between D&D and wargaming, where it's easy to make facile analogies based on surface similarities like the use of minis while missing out on the stark differences in the underlying procedural and play assumptions. I am not opposed to structurally-oriented, and even dissociated systems in principle. I do, however, think it is essential that designers are making informed decisions when incorporating "competitive" elements into their designs. And it's especially important for D&D, given its heritage.

There are no Coincidences...

2011-06-07T22:53:00.000-04:00

This is a principle, if you like, for a Mage game that's just starting out. The game's inspirations include a simple little bit of dialogue from Planetary: "It's a strange world." "Let's keep it that way." (Inspirations also include just about everything else about that book. Also, The Twilight Zone will probably be due for some dedicated viewing.)

Basic assumptions include that none of the setting from Mage is the setting for this game, or not necessarily. We'll build upwards and outwards. The rules are what they are, though, and we build from there. They're the chassis.

It's requiring me to dust off some different GMing tools than I've been using much lately. And maybe develop some new ones.

Today's principle is this.

"There are no coincidences."

This arises from both practical and fictional stuff. Practical because it's the modern world (sort of) and it's also an RPG (really) and some kinds of implausible things are bound to happen or have happened. Like the police officer might not arrest or properly question a group of suspects about an event that must have looked very suspicious from the officer's point of view. Why not? Practical reasons, maybe. It's an RPG. But that's not good enough.

On the other hand, fictional reasons... now we're talking. So that happened. The question now is why.

There are no coincidences.

If it seems strange, it probably is...

The Heist Clock

2011-04-20T23:43:00.003-04:00

I've praised the classic D&D turn before, and how it ties into the cycle of wandering monster checks, surprise, reaction checks, morale, escape and pursuit, searching, trapfinding, forcing doors and working at locks, and rest to create "mission time." I've also mentioned my fondness for the idea of twisting D&D for heist style games.

The Heist Clock is an idea for how to leverage the classic exploration turn cycle to run heists in D&D. Here's the basic idea.

Start with your favorite version of D&D. I like B/X as a starting point for this, but any classic version will do out of the box. With 3rd edition and newer versions, you'll have to institute your own timekeeping and wandering monster check conventions or borrow the ones from a pre-3rd edition version of D&D.

Here are a few basic assumptions I started with:

1 turn equals about 10 minutes.
Many actions cost 1 turn worth of time, including movement at cautious exploration speed, and also things like combat, searching an area for traps, picking a lock, and so on. These items move the clock forward.
Every 2 turns, check for wandering monsters. Monsters are encountered on a 1 in 6.
Check surprise for each party. On 1-2, the party is surprised.
Reaction checks: 1 attack, 2 hostile, 3-4 uncertain, 5 no attack, 6 friendly/helpful.
Working traps are sprung on a 2 in 6 chance if passed or if an action is taken that might trigger them.

For the Heist Clock, the turn becomes somewhat more abstracted. A turn is often ten minutes, but it may be five minutes or less. The GM can still keep rough track of time, but what becomes more important is ticks of the clock.

When the heist begins, the clock starts ticking.

The following actions cause an additional tick of the clock.

Cautious, stealthy movement (i.e., movement at the default exploration rate)
Climbing or overcoming a physical obstacle
Picking a lock on a door or vault
Evaluating a lock, door, vault, or object for traps
One attempt to disarm a trap or other device
Any spellcasting that includes a verbal component
Forcing a door (quick, but loud)
Taking out a sentry, if done relatively quickly and without too much noise
Leaving evidence that you've been in the place (the room is a mess after you searched it, there was a fight and you can't cover it up, you're scattering the bodies of sentries all over the place, etc.)
A combat
Checking a 10 by 10 area for traps
Checking a small room for secret doors and hidden treasure caches
Stopping in the middle of the job to plan, plot, argue about shares, etc.
Anything else that might increase the likelihood of a complication arising

Every 2nd tick, a check is made for complications. Complications are roughly equivalent to Wandering Monster checks, but a bit more varied. If the place is not on alert, a complication occurs on a 1 in 6. If the place is on increased awareness because you've made a little noise, a complication occurs on a 2 in 6. If the place is on alert, a complication occurs on a 3 in 6.

If a complication occurs, roll 1d20 on the following table to see what kind of complication arises. This table is a template table, created with the rainy city in mind, but fairly adaptable. When prepping for each heist, the DM should review this table and personalize selected entries to reflect the particular location that the PCs are hitting. If it says "Magic/Weird Trap," for example, the DM should decide what that trap will be as part of prep. And so on. Here's the template:

Roll 1d20 for a Complication

Magic or weird trap
Locking bars/gates/doors
Silent alarm calls in external help
Mundane trap
Alarm is tripped, raising alert level or calling guards
Guest of the house
Family member of the house
Servant
Small guard patrol (define "small" based on the locale)
Large guard patrol (define "large" based on the locale)
The Lord of the house
False cache is discovered (cache is alarmed or trapped)
Animated object
Genius Loci
Ghost or poltergeist
Cursed item (item is locked away, alarmed, or trapped)
A curse/geas is triggered
Magic or weird guardian
Cross a pentagram, something is released
Rival crew of thieves robbing the place at the same time

In addition to the above random complications, it's also possible to seed the place with random discoveries. I'm using a bunch of floorplans from mansions and large houses for most of these break ins, with some D&D style maps thrown in as well. It's easy to assign 2d4 locations in the house as sites for potential discoveries. If the players search an appropriate room and succeed in finding secret or hidden things, they find the discovery in addition to whatever else might be there. This table can be tailored to the mission as well, or these can be rolled up ahead of time.

Discoveries

Trapped demon, imp, ifrit, ghul, fairy, or other magical being tied to a pentagram or item
Magic pool, fountain, deck of cards, other source of random good and bad things for the risk takers
Magic gate, goblin door, wardrobe
Secret room
Spell components or lab ingredients
Incriminating evidence against the owner of the house, e.g. of conspiracy, cult membership, etc.
Scroll(s)
Potion(s)
Gem(s)
Coins
Jewelry
Art objects
Papers, deeds, letters of marque
Magic item
Genius Loci who will help the party, dislikes the owner of the house
Spellbook
Other ally (servant, family member, guest, etc. who dislikes the owner or wants a cut)
Memento mori of value
Vault or hoard
Secret escape tunnel or other passage out of the house

The AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual that might have been

2011-04-17T00:02:00.004-04:00

The AD&D 2nd edition Monstrous Manual is one of the high points of 2nd edition, a fact that has been rightfully championed by noisms both on his blog and at RPG.net. It's nearly a perfect monster book, and it could have been even better.

But what if it had been entirely illustrated by Tony DiTerlizzi? Wishful thinking?

It almost happened.

Over the last couple days, thanks to the work of a colleague, Ari Berk, Central Michigan University has been hosting "Imagining the Fantastic," and Tony is one of the guests. The talks, art, and panel discussions have been fantastic, and Ari really pulled it off with this one. It's a rare opportunity to have artists of such caliber visiting mid-Michigan. It's been especially great because it has been relatively small event. Big for Mt. Pleasant, certainly, and a success on all counts. But still much smaller than the usual conventions you might find these folks at, allowing just about anyone to have real conversations with the guests.

Thanks to this, I had a chance to meet Tony, and he was a friendly, engaging guy who was a pleasure to talk to, and who seemed genuinely pleased when I asked him if he had any favorite illustrations from the Monstrous Manual. He didn't say, but instead told me the story of his involvement with it. After working on Dragon Mountain, his first job with TSR, he was invited to be involved with the Monstrous Manual and asked which creatures or creature types he'd be interested in working on. He'd responded by submitting a variety of things and telling them to let him know what they'd like him to do, based on his samples. And to his surprise, TSR asked him to illustrate the full book.

Unfortunately, at the time, they also wanted it with such a short deadline that he couldn't possibly have done it. Instead, he only was able to do certain creature types, and other artists worked on the rest of the monsters. If you've ever looked at your Monstrous Manual and thought, as I have, "Why isn't this whole book illustrated by DiTerlizzi?", now you know. To TSR's credit, they recognized the genius of asking him to do the whole book. Unfortunately, deadlines and publication schedules got in the way. It's still a fantastic book, but damn, that is a "might have been" for the ages.

The Cleric Comes Full Circle

2011-04-06T20:19:00.006-04:00

There's some old school vampire hunter cleric-y goodness in here.

It's too bad we don't get whole movies animated like this. (Clone Wars, I'm looking at you.)

Via Cartoon Brew.

Imagining the Fantastic: Mythic Art, Music, and Conversation at Central Michigan University

2011-03-18T09:05:00.003-04:00

April 15 & 16, 2011 Central Michigan University will be host to a two day event featuring Ari Berk, Brian Froud, Wendy Froud, Tony DiTerlizzi, Charles Vess,
Elizabeth-Jane Baldry, Carolyn Dunn, Edward Gamarra.

Imagining the Fantastic: Mythic Art, Music, and Conversation at Central Michigan University

It's nice to have something like this right in my own backyard! Kudos to Ari Berk for putting it together.

A Walk in the Sump

2011-03-10T18:20:00.005-05:00

Welcome to the Sump -- The Rainy City's boggy, waterlogged slums -- a place of rotting huts on tilted stilts, of murk and muck, of shaky walkways over muddy pools, and of beggars, rafts, and rice. Watch your step!

1d20 Sump Happenings

1. A Barge Bar: A flat swamp barge with a rough tarp to keep off most of the rain. Patrons sit on the floor of the barge, drinking rice wine from bowls, dipping their cups in buckets of the stuff for refills.

2. Leech Hunters: A team of 1d4+1 men sitting in a flat bottomed boat. Leaky empty casks on heavy ropes trail off the sides of the ship, each with a piece of bloody meat in the bottom. When enough fat leeches make it into a bucket, they pull it in and add to their stock.

3. Slumming Midtowners: Probably looking for cheap thrills, cheap rice wine, and small frogs.

4. Will O' the Wisp: Faintly glowing lights dance through the shadows just off the path. During the day, they flicker away immediately. At night, save vs spells or follow them. If followed, roll 1d6: on a 1-4 they lead you into a muddy bog (swim, if you can), 5 into a tar pit, 6 to the door of a sunken crypt.

5. Poison frog: Don't lick it if you have any work to do today. (Roll 1d6, on a 1 tripping, sweating, puking, save vs poison or die, 2-3 tripping, sweating, puking, but ok, 4 tripping, sweating, nauseuous, 5 tripping, sweating, 6 feels good man.)

6. Giant poison frog: Don't lick it. (Roll 1d6, on a 1-5 tripping, sweating, puking, you die (no save), on a 6 tripping, sweating, puking, save vs poison or die.)

6. Bog Wight: A lot of corpses get dumped in the Sump. Some of them come back up. (Roll 1d6, on a 1-2 treat as Skeleton, 3-4 as Zombie, 5 as Ghoul, 6 as Wight.)

7. Fresh Tar Pit: Tar bubbling up from the muck -- fresh tar pit emerging. Roll 1d6, on 1-3 it's just a little tar, maybe a bucket full, 4-5 it's enough for a few days of tar mining, 6 there's a tar geyser and a new tar mine will be opened here for 1d6 months).

8. Wine Wife Needs Help: A wine-maker will pay 1d6 good pieces of copper and a free cup of rice wine for help unloading rice from her boat to her distillery shack.

9. Mad Cadger: A crazy beggar spouting dire predictions about the future, 1 in 6 chance the cadger is a true diviner.

10. Wisper Men: A group of 1d4+2 men with wide brimmed hats and lanterns on poles. During the day, they're resting under a canopy. At night, they're out hunting Will o' the Wisps. They catch the lights and separate them, neutralizing the charm effect. Individual wisps can be sold for lanterns. When hunting, each man is chained to the raft. The keys are with the Wisper Master back at the hut.

11. Sump Gang: Local gang members are watching you. Make a reaction check. On a friendly result, you look like a potential customer. On a hostile result, you look like competition. They are armed with knives, hatchets, long razors, and hand axes.

12. Drunken Tar Miners: Off duty tar miners, drinking, gambling, and swapping tales about weird crypts hidden in the mud of the Sump, tar demons, and lost treasures.

13. Chemist: Chemist down from Old Town to collect herbal ingredients for alchemical drugs and potions. Has a small boat and 1d6 apprentices. Myriad bags, baskets, boxes, and vials litter the boat.

14. The Worm's Man: Old man in rags, carrying a cottonmouth in his left hand, out on an errand. He is the servant of the worm that lives in the ruined well at the heart of the Sump. The worm will make your wish come true, but you must make a wish come true for it in exchange. The worm's man is still paying for his wish, whatever it was.

15. Logging Jack Crew: Logging Jacks cutting good wood for sale to Old Town craftsmen. They're busy with work, but may have news about current wood prices or recent Old Town rumors.

16. Cormorant Fisher: Fisherman with a cormorant with cord tied about its neck. The cormorant dips below and brings up fish but can't swallow. The fisherman harvests his catch but gives the cormorant its due.

17. Jaunty Hat Floating in the Muck: If recovered, it bestows upon the wearer a certain panache. If worn in the middle class neighborhood of Prominence Bluffs ("The Mids") after dark, there is a 1 in 6 chance each hour that the wearer is attacked by the Mids Murderer and his Demon Arm.

18. Uncle Snapper: Ancient snapping turtle, roughly the size of a bull. Floating aimlessly. Harmless unless provoked.

19. Allspice: Grocer boat, possibly heading to or from Bridger's Market. Selling rice, cattail, kelp, leeches, shellfish, lampreys, frog, and eel.

20. Lily Mourners: Water lilies float up from the spot where someone has drowned. A group of sorrowful mourners (1d4) prays near a new lily. Roll 1d6, on 1-4, they are praying for the lost soul, on 5 they are letting down hooks trying to dredge up the body to rifle its pockets, on 6 they're doing both.

Genealogy of the Two-Weapon Fighting Ranger

2011-02-26T12:24:00.008-05:00

Thoughts prompted by flipping through various AD&D books in just the right order.

In AD&D 1e, rangers don't have two weapon fighting.

In AD&D 2e, they do. Drizzt is, I think, commonly cited as the source. But where did Drizzt's two weapon fighting come from?

Unearthed Arcana.

It was Unearthed Arcana that introduced the Drow as an official PC race. And as Unearthed Arcana (p. 10) notes:

Dark elves do not gain the combat bonuses of the surface elves with regard to sword and bow, but may fight with two weapons without penalty, provided each weapon may be easily wielded in one hand.

This ability may have precedents in the D series of modules or other sources (Dragon?). Anyone know?

So here's what I'm seeing. A two weapon wielding dark elf ranger who is an exile from his homeland (see UA p. 10, again) is a legitimate starting character type in AD&D, via Unearthed Arcana. The books take off, people dig Drizzt, and the two weapon fighting thing gets transferred/associated with the character class (ranger) rather than the race (dark elf) in a lot of people's minds. AD&D 2e makes it official. From 3e (3.5, especially) on, it is generalized even more, leading to weapon styles, which are especially numerous in Pathfinder.

Maybe you already knew this. I just realized it (assuming I'm getting the major lines of descent right).

Addendum:

The literary inspiration for the original D&D ranger was Strider.

Now it's Drizzt.

Modern D&D -- Ouroboros or Oedipus?

Fisticuffs in D&D

2011-01-05T15:55:00.006-05:00

Bar brawls.

Man, did we have bar brawls when we played D&D in junior high and high school. I think some days our D&D campaign would have been better titled "Punch a Cavalier in his Arrogant Face: The Role Playing Game."

So your party is in yet another bar brawl. When you roll to hit, also roll an extra 1d6. If you hit, refer to the following table for the results:

Brawling

1 One-Two Punch (you are +1 to hit this target next round)

2 Kidney Punch (victim is -1 to hit next round due to pain)

3 Low Blow (if male, victim must save vs paralysis or lose next action)

4 Uppercut (+2 damage)

5 Head Butt (victim must save vs paralysis or be stunned next round: may move or attack but not both)

6 Haymaker (+1d3 damage)

This is loosely inspired by the brawling and wrestling tables from AD&D 2nd edition, and should be usable with your favorite version of classic D&D. I went with a d6 to keep the number of possibilities small, thus better creating a coherent sense of a particular style of fighting. This way I can do other styles like so:

Halfling Folkstyle Wrestling

1 Foot Stomp (victim may not move next round)

2 Double Leg Tackle (victim must save vs Paralysis or be knocked down, automatically losing initiative next round)

3 Bear Hug (victim must save vs Paralysis or be held next round; fighter may apply damage to held victim next round without an attack roll)

4 Clothesline (victim must save vs Paralysis or lose next action getting up from the ground)

5 Ear Clap (victim is -1 AC next round from stun)

6 Uppercut (if victim is halfling sized, +2 damage; if victim is human sized, treat as Low Blow)

Or so:

Monkey Kung Fu

1 Drunken Monkey (fighter gains +1 AC for one round)

2 Stone Monkey (fighter takes -1d3 damage from all attacks for one round)

3 Lost Monkey (fighter is at +1 to hit due to the trickiness of their attacks)

4 Standing Monkey (fighter attacks from distance; victim must move in again to make a melee attack)

5 Wooden Monkey (+1d3 damage from barrage of attacks)

6 Monkey Steals the Peach (if male, victim must save vs paralysis or lose next action)

Or weapon-based systems like so:

Sword and Board

1 Defensive Slash (+1 AC)

2 Hold the Line (opponents may not move past the fighter)

3 Shield Bash (+1d3 damage)

4 Shield Rush (victim is knocked back one square and fighter may enter the breach)

5 Shield Pin (victim must save vs. Paralysis or be pinned and unable to move next round)

6 All Out Attack (+2 damage)

Or monsters like so:

Dragon Bite

1 Rending Bite (victim is -1 to attack next round from pain)

2 Piercing Bite (victim is -1 AC next round from damage to armor)

3 Shaking Bite (victim is shaken up and takes 1d6 additional damage)

4 Chew 'em Up (save vs paralysis or be caught in dragon's jaws; dragon may deal bite damage next round without rolling to hit)

5 Spit 'em Out (roll dex or lower on 1d20 or be spit out of melee range; must spend next round getting back into range or use a ranged weapon)

6 Flaming Bite (+Dragon's HD in additional damage from breath weapon crackling out during the bite)

The effects assume you're not using minis, so they abstract things a bit. If you're using minis, you can probably translate the effects of throws and the like into inches or squares pretty readily. It would be fairly easy to expand this into a bunch of different fighting styles and weapon styles. Fighters could learn one unarmed or weapon style for every so many levels (e.g., 1st, 3rd, 6th, 9th). Rogues could learn a style or two (e.g. one at 3rd level, another at 9th). Clerics could learn one at 3rd and 9th as well. Magic Users might be allowed one at 6th, if at all. Monks/Mystics might get as many as one style every level, with the requirement that 2/3rds or more of the styles be unarmed. Anyone with more than one style must declare which style they're using at the beginning of the round, before dice are rolled. If you don't declare a style, it's assumed that you are using the style you used last round. If it's the first round of the fight and you don't declare a style, it's assumed you're just attacking normally.

The effects are kept small in most cases. I don't want these to circumvent the basic "to hit roll + damage roll vs hit points" economy of the game, just add a little random, fun spice without requiring players to improvise elaborate descriptions of what they are doing each round.

Other Notes

No effects last more than one round, to avoid adding a bunch of modifiers to track.
Only one style can be declared active per round.
The really minor effects just happen.
More serious effects (leading to lost actions, etc.) provide a save to avoid the effect.

The system is pretty loose, so GMs will probably have to adjudicate details and extrapolate from context (e.g., A halfling can't take down a dragon. Should be able to tackle a human to the ground, though, if you're running a somewhat unrealistic adventure style game.)

Also, here's another take on kung fu for D&D, in case you're in the market and it better fits your style of game.

The Fantasy Trip Reference Sheets

2011-01-02T23:28:00.004-05:00

The Fantasy Trip is a fantastic game, but not one of the best organized. This is especially true for the listings of talents and spells, which aren't very efficient when needed for quick reference during character creation or at the table. Because of this, I've created a few of summary sheets and alphabetical reference booklets, which I use when we play the game, alongside David O. Miller's excellent play aides. Thanks to Fenway5's recent Melee/Wizard/TFT kick, I've decided to share thesee. I hope someone find them useful.

Tables

The following are simple summary tables of the talents (along with prerequisites) and spells. There are two versions of each table: one full alphabetical listing and one organized by IQ requirement.

Reference Booklets

I often find that I need to look up a talent or skill, and finding its specific effects goes much faster with a full alphabetized list. The following files are meant for booklet style printing. I keep a copy of each handy whenever I'm running the game.

The Advanced Hero's Book of Talents
The Advanced Wizard's Book of Spells

Also, check out Fenway5's recent series of posts. He's been talking about Melee, Wizard, and The Fantasy Trip over the last few days, not only sharing a cool link to a copy of Melee he found, but also releasing his own Sword & Shield combat game for free on his Roguish FRP blog.

2010 Gaming Year in Review

2010-12-31T13:42:00.002-05:00

It's been a good year for gaming here at Superhero Necromancer HQ. For my own curiosity as much as anything else, I thought I'd take a look back at what we've been playing. Here's a list of RPGs that we played during 2010, in rough chronological order. I'm probably missing something, but this covers the main bases.

Games of 2010

Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game: We played this twice this year, once near the beginning of the year and once just last week. Both sessions have been a blast. Street Fighter is an effortlessly fun game for me. I know the rules, I know the world, and I have plenty of ideas for modern pulp and martial arts adventure. It plays fast and always has a good balance between action, adventure, and banter. This time around, Street Fighter also served for a Christmas adventure involving fist fights with the Bavarian Illuminati in an Alpine castle ski resort with the krampus running amok on the slopes.
Dungeons and Dragons (Rules Cyclopedia): The Rainy City campaign is primarily built on a D&D Rules Cyclopedia chassis, with D&D pastiche elements. One of the players is running an OD&D alchemist from Dragon Magazine, and I use the 2nd edition AD&D spell and magic item compendiums as well as any monster books from any classic edition of D&D that are handy. It's also an easy pick up game for me as I have the city handy for play when needed. It doesn't hurt that it's a chance to use my favorite version of D&D, the BX/BECM/RC line.
Apocalypse World: I enjoyed this each time we played it. I ran it once and played it twice, and I'd be happy to play it again. I regret not having done any linked sessions -- each play session was more of a independent one shot, and my understanding is that the game works best with campaign play.
Dungeons and Dragons (4E): Played a one shot of this at a con. I had a good time playing a classic wizard (i.e., one with more ego than ability).
Dungeons and Dragons (Pathfinder): This is our default system for The Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps. I've run it for most of the sessions but also played in one. I especially like 3.x D&D from the player's side of the screen. RSDC tends to be a very talky game, with relatively little in the way of action and fighting, so we're probably not leveraging most of the 3.x game system. But I'd be hard pressed to imagine some of the PCs having been conceived had a different game system been the basis.
The Fantasy Trip: I just love this game. We used it for a campaign last year, but this year I think we only played it once as an RPG, using it for a one-shot Rainy City session at Halloween. It's a good fit for the rainy city, as it comes pre-packaged with alchemy and gargoyles and skill checks for burglary and the like.
Call of Cthulhu: CoC made a cameo appearance in one of our Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps games, when a group of diplomats entered the Desert of Cosmic Horrors. We did an on the spot conversion of the characters to CoC terms and used a loose approximation of the system for action resolution and sanity checks in the desert and pyramids of cosmic horrors. The players were, I think, rightly relieved when they returned to their D&D stats.
Gamma World (D&D 4E-based edition): This game seems to have almost entirely taken over our gaming since its release. It's easy to see why. It's sleek, random fun, and it accommodates all the weirdness you throw at it. Here are some examples from our recent play of the game: a Chernobyl blasted plant super soldier; a pyrokinetic samurai named Markus (but if you like you can call him "sensei"); a spirit of the earth emerged from a cave to set things right (and destroy abominations); ninjas made of nightmares serving a baboon ninja lord with a nightmare sword; vampires of the frozen north with an undead army, a frankenstein's monster mad scientist, a werewolf in the basement, and a crashed flying saucer out on the snow; a robot shark death machine serving fish men in a nautilus submarine; the robot collective's "vandals" poisoning a river to kill mutants; a fat crocodile crying on his jet ski because it won't start; getting trapped in the fever dreams of a super-psychic little green man from outer space still stuck in stasis; competing in the "pain games" (think Running Man); and of course, The Curse of the Kill Bot...

And 2011 promises more of the same thrills, plus! Rolemaster! and Heavy Gear! and more.

So cheers to a great 2010 and great expectations for the coming year!

DiTerlizzi on breaking into illustration for D&D

2010-12-08T21:56:00.002-05:00

I found this DiTerlizzi interview interesting. Thought I'd share.

Blogging by whim

2010-11-30T21:51:00.005-05:00

RPG blogging is a thing of whim and fancy for me, and lately my whims have returned to Street Fighter. I have a new RPG-related Street Fighter post up at the other blog, which I'll shameless promote here just one more time: Street Fighter martial arts, some explorations.

From here on out, I'll stick to keeping most of the street fighter stuff over there and D&D-cetera and general roleplaying stuff over here, so don't worry about this blog turning into a series of "look over there" type posts.

The Desert of Cosmic Horror

2010-11-29T21:24:00.005-05:00

Strange things happen in the desert.

Yes, somehow, given the choice of spending their next diplomatic assignment at either The Spider Swamp, Crater Town, or The Desert of Cosmic Horror, our envoys decided that cosmic horrors would probably be more amenable to diplomacy than spiders or alien puddings.

I suppose if you're going to be negotiating with the unknowable in any case, it is reasonable to go big or go home.

Upon entering the desert, we quickly converted to the characters to a loose version of Call of Cthulhu. At first, I wasn't sure it was working, but sure enough, as time in the desert wore on, even the simplest kinds of banal monstrosities D&D adventurers otherwise take for granted (corpses, bloody altars, strange runes) took on new meanings. And sanity scores slowly dwindled.

Only when the diplomats sailed into the underworld did their dependable D&D stats return. I don't think I've ever seen anyone so relieved to enter the kingdom of the dead.

In the end, the diplomats dealt with the usual mix of diplomatic challenges.

strange stars above the desert, uncountable, unrecognizable, wrong
silent jackals, always watching from the next dune
an archaologist from another world, gone quite mad and making terrible sacrifices upon the altar hidden in his tent
the archaeologist's shadowy double (demon? ghul? doppelganger?)
runes of the crawling chaos, messenger of the outer gods
a trap-filled pyramid, of course
mummified guardians inviting the diplomats onto a funerary barge
the black river to the underworld
the shade of the great kingdom in the underworld, safe these long eons from the crawling chaos
the boy king and god of the great kingdom, who was happy to negotiate, for all the good a dead king's alliance will do them in the face of cosmic horrors above

To their credit, the diplomats were also smart enough to politely refuse the pharoah's kind offer of a meal at his table.

Ah, the life of a diplomat!

Recently, on the Superhero Necromancer Channel

2010-11-25T18:54:00.006-05:00

Here are some things we've been up to, of late.

In The Rainy City, a rather grim bunch stole into a necromancer's tower by night. Their intentions were not good.

This PC quote from the start of the session rather set the tone:

"I like dead people. They have things. Things that don't belong to nobody."

In The Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps, a recent diplomatic mission to Marrow Deep, led by a discredited (?) ranger, the layabout, underachieving 18th son of a nobleman, and the Justin Bieber of necromancers ended in... something resembling a treaty with a very bad dead thing, or demon perhaps. The distinction is probably academic. Also, a good hound was lost. The dead rose. Villagers slandered the king. And a god was threatened in a most unseemly manner.

In Gamma Terra, a ragtag crew of mutant boat people (why is it always boat people with this game?) encountered first hand the Curse of the Kill Bot somewhere along the waterways of rural Gamma Michigan. While they have stopped it, for now, before it could eat more people, it has already uploaded its consciousness to the scattered remains of the global satellite network. The kill bot is dead, but its curse lives on...

And finally, elsewhere, I updated my other blog that is never updated, with brand new Street Fighter content.

I am the Justin Bieber of Necromancers

2010-11-16T14:26:00.004-05:00

There are many insights to be gained from playing RPGs. Truths about ourselves and our friends. New understandings of the world around us. Striking experiences of the power of stories in our lives.

And then there are the other truths, less profound perhaps, but no less sublime.

Fifteen Games

2010-10-19T20:46:00.005-04:00

These are the first fifteen that came to me, in the order they popped into my head.

Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game
Dungeons & Dragons
Kult
Underground
Marvel Super Heroes
Heavy Gear
Vampire: The Masquerade
Shadowrun
Castle Falkenstein
Dark Conspiracy
Cyberpunk 2020
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
Call of Cthulhu
The Fantasy Trip
Ars Magica

I was thinking "RPG only" at the time. If I'd been including other games, the Street Fighter video games would have bumped something off the chart, and Legend of Zelda and Mario games would probably have been in there too. Given the unpredictability of stream of consciousness associative thinking, I don't know what would have been bumped in particular. Hat tip.

The Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps

2010-10-18T21:49:00.000-04:00

In addition to a recent Rainy City game, which I'll try to post about eventually, we've lately been playing The Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps, inspired by a post by "Josh Roby" at Story Games nearly four years ago. I'll give you his pitch first. Then I'll follow up with some notes from our game.

For thousands of years, the Kingdom has beaten back the monsters lurking in its darkest corners, raided the abandoned dungeons where they dwelled, and slaying the beasts wherever they were found.

With the ascension of Good King George, however, we have seen the dawn of a new day. Guided by his new bride, the drow queen Sabine, the King has outlawed violence against monstrous citizens of the kingdom and established an order of diplomats to visit the dungeons and collapsed castles where they dwell in order to make amends.

It is George's unique wisdom to understand that the so-called "monsters" really are people, too, driven into the inaccessible reaches of the kingdom by fear and ignorance. Millenia of war have only served to oppress these poor souls, denying them the opportunity to own and till fields and raise their spawn in as much comfort as they could. The only permanent solution to the situation was not annihilation and genocide, but coming together in the spirit of peace and understanding.

The job of George's Diplomats is not easy. Generations of mistrust have turned the hearts of the monsters cold and hard, and what few stop to listen believe that a human king would extend an olive branch to their kind. The situation is made even more difficult by the actions of a few diehard "adventurers" who refuse to let go of the ways of the past. But still, no matter the history of violence or the continuing remnants of hatred, the diplomatic corps stands ready to create tomorrow by building bridges of hope, understanding, and mutual respect.

We're three sessions into a Royal Subterranean Diplomatic Corps mini-campaign here at Superhero Necromancer HQ, and so far it's lived up to its promise. Intrepid diplomats have been offered a number of possible sites to visit on diplomatic missions, and two negotiations have been completed. Successfully? (By some measures!)

The following diplomatic assignments have been completed so far:

Winterpeak, home of the Winter Witch, as well as the nearby Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl. Diplomats have successfully made contact with the Winter Witch, though unfortunately they also awoke her father, a very old god from a different age: the North Wind. She was not very happy about this! He is a cold, uncaring god, but the diplomats did manage to make a deal with him: he would allow them to worship him and build his church within their kingdom. For although he does not need worshippers, he likes them! Now, there will still be the matter of dealing with his ten sons, who are sure to invade the kingdom to slay him when the next winter arrives. But that is months away! Plenty of time.
Dungeon Skull Mountain (I couldn't resist), a vast megadungeon fortress where the Dark Lord dwells, along with his nine. The diplomatic corps has made contact with the Dark Lord and his nine, and they have made a deal with him. Admittedly, in the process, one of the diplomats did quit the corps and join the Dark Lord (better job prospects, in terms of promotions, you know). On the other hand, one of the nine, the Vampire Lord Lightbane, quit the forces of Dungeon Skull Mountain and joined the diplomatic corps. So some progress was made! Now the Corps need only find the location of the god of death so that the Dark Lord can kill him. Before the end of the year. As stipulated in the contract.

Other sites which await visits from the Corps include:

The Spider Swamp, where numerous expeditions have been sent in the last six moons since the founding of the RSDC. None have returned, yet. But now that the training has been doubled to two full days, the leaders of the Corps are really quite certain that the next group will meet with success.
Crater Town, where a star fell some hundred years ago, and where miners now dig for strange and precious metals and stones. Many miners have over the years fallen prey to strange humours and have begun thinking... gelatinous... thoughts. Diplomatic relations must be opened with the entities behind these thoughts.

Finally, the following sites can also be seen on the map of the kingdom, but no diplomats have been sent to them as yet:

The Pit of the Necromancer
The Black Duke's Fortress
The Mines of the Mountain King
The Valley of the Unicorns
The Desert of Cosmic Horror
The Shire

I'll never read Planescape's prose the same way again

2010-10-06T09:54:00.004-04:00

From Steve Roud's discussion of Cockney rhyming slang in his excellent London Lore: The Legends and Traditions of the World's Most Vibrant City:

Several terms that started as rhyming slang have now entered the general language, albeit not at the posh end of the spectrum. It is not uncommon to hear the verb to rabbit (from rabbit and pork), meaning to talk a lot, or for someone to say, 'Let's have a butcher's at that', or 'That's a load of old cobblers'. There are many people who say 'He's a right berk', or 'He's a proper Charlie', without realising that the words originated as contractions of Berkshire Hunt and Charlie Hunt.

Exorcising Dragons: An Addendum to the Literary and Folkloric Precedents for Dragon Subdual

2010-09-18T12:01:00.003-04:00

I was re-reading Dunsany's "The Hoard of the Gibbelins" earlier this week and was reminded of a literary precedent for dragon subdual that I thought I should add to supplement my previous post, "Exorcising Dragons."

I don't know how I forgot to mention this one the first time.

Alderic thus decided: he would take no horse down to the river's edge, he would not row along it in a boat, and he would go alone and by way of the Forest Unpassable.

How pass, you may say, the unpassable? This was his plan: there was a dragon he knew of who if peasants' prayers are heeded deserved to die, not alone because of the number of maidens he cruelly slew, but because he was bad for the crops; he ravaged the very land and was the bane of a dukedom.

Now Alderic determined to go up against him. So he took horse and spear and pricked till he met the dragon, and the dragon came out against him breathing bitter smoke. And to him Alderic shouted, "Hath foul dragon ever slain true knight?" And well the dragon knew that this had never been, and he hung his head and was silent, for he was glutted with blood. "Then," said the knight, "if thou would'st ever taste maiden's blood again thou shalt be my trusty steed, and if not, by this spear there shall befall thee all that the troubadours tell of the dooms of thy breed."

And the dragon did not open his ravening mouth, nor rush upon the knight, breathing out fire; for well he knew the fate of those that did these things, but he consented to the terms imposed, and swore to the knight to become his trusty steed.

It was on a saddle upon this dragon's back that Alderic afterwards sailed above the unpassable forest, even above the tops of those measureless trees, children of wonder.

Lord Dunsany, The Hoard of the Gibbelins

This has it all.

First, as is typical of dragons in the old tales, the thing is a pestilence upon the very land itself, ruining crops with its foul presence. A classic dragon trope.

Second, the dragon knows it cannot defeat the knight and so submits. Indeed, is subdued, acting in servitude to the knight. It does try mightily later in the tale to snap at maidens as it passes, but Aldric holds it under his control. I also like that the dragon knows how these kinds of stories always end -- there's a nice wink to the reader there, an invitation to fellow lovers of wondrous tales to join in recognizing the tropes of the genre, which is not uncommon with Dunsany.

Third, the knight puts a saddle on the dragon and rides it. That's just cool. It was cool in 1912, cool in 1974, cool in 1984, and cool in 2010 and beyond.

Addendum to the addendum: Also, Aldric is a D&D adventurer. He's a real bastard. He just wants to steal from the Gibbelins (who, it should be noted, only keep piles of gold around to attract adventurers for them to eat!). Look at his deal with the dragon, 'Look, if you ever want to taste the sweet, sweet blood of a virgin girl again, you're going to have to work with me on this." He's not fighting dragons to protect fair maidens. He just needs a ride over the Forest Unpassable so he can loot that hoard.

Elves are Dicks: Dark Sun Edition

2010-07-29T15:08:00.004-04:00

You think elves are dicks in your favorite generic fantasy world? Well try Dark Sun on for size. I submit the following:

Elves run for days on end. If elders and pregnant women fall behind, they leave them to die (Dark Sun Campaign Setting: Rules Book, p. 6). It's a good thing elves are so fertile, otherwise they might have a population problem!
Elves are a race of itinerant thieves (Dark Sun Campaign Setting, choose any page with the word "elf" on it.).
Elves travelling with outsiders set up "tests" of "trust." These tests might include sabotaging the water supply and seeing if they still get a "fair" share. Also, getting captured by enemies on purpose or picking unnecessary fights with deadly enemies for the sole purpose of forcing potential "friends" to step up into mortal danger to prove their "trustworthiness." Elves get bonus XP for doing this kind of thing (Dark Sun Campaign Setting: Rules Book, p. 66). Yes. Elves are worried about whether or not you can be trusted.

The Fantasy Trip was made for Dark Sun.

2010-07-29T14:16:00.005-04:00

Consider:

Gladiators. TFT is built on the chassis of a head-to-head, hex-and-chit mini-game. Gladiatorial-style combats are exactly where the combat system sings.

Preservers and Defilers: A perfect fit. The only difference between a preserver and a defiler is how you choose to act. All wizards can choose to draw magic from their own strength, as default TFT assumes. Or they can draw it from living things around them (saving their own strength). Make your choice. It's no wonder the templars are out to destroy not only renegade defilers but also preservers -- they're all a potential threat to the food supplies, making them an even greater threat to the rule of the local Sorcerer King than they are just for being wizards. They're not just competition. They're a potentially destabilizing force. Without any food, the desperate slaves may be pushed entirely over the brink into rebellion.

There are no gods. As in Dark Sun, there are no gods. Now, Dark Sun did give cleric players the option of being elemental clerics, but fuck that noise. With TFT, there are no gods, and that's that. Religious leaders can take the appropriate talents (Priest & Theologian). If they want to also true miracle workers, they can use wizardry to accomplish their miracles, always drawing from their own strength rather than defiling the world around them. As a bonus, summoning and controlling elemental powers is particularly interesting in TFT. Of course, that does make them charlatans (or deluded). Hey, it's a harsh world. Also, miracle working holy men and women are certain to attract the attention of the Sorcerer Kings's Templars, for all the reasons preservers and defilers do plus the fact that they're horning in on the King's whole "divinity" angle. Templars, of course, are just wizards with religious talents in the Sorcerer King's employ.

Races: The races are pretty well accounted for. Elves are already fast when unarmored (higher MA). Giants (renamed half-giants) are already a default player race. Even half-dwarves are mentioned in the monster/character section of In the Labyrinth. I'd probably want to add their exertion thing, but that's portable. Also, Hymenopterans are a good base for Thri-Kreen. Halflings, interestingly, have a bonus to reaction checks. I think this can be attributed to their tendency toward cultural mimicry in the Dark Sun setting -- they're trying so hard to fit in!

It's a dangerous world. TFT combat is brutal. Life is short and ugly under the dark sun. TFT keeps it that way.

But what about psionics?

Not built in, but easy to accommodate. Here's what I'd do. First, I'd pull out a list of "psionic" type spells from the default TFT spell list as available psionic abilities. Second, during character creation, anyone can learn these at no penalty as psionics. First psionic talent costs 1 IQ, second costs 2, third costs 3. (Probably -- or maybe 2,3,4). They can be cast at no DX penalty regardless of whether the character is a hero or wizard. Also, they don't require somatic/verbal components. However, unlike wizards, you can never draw energy for "casting" from the world around you (of course). Also, no spellbooks, item enchantments, etc. That's off the top of my head. There might be other balancing tweaks needed, but that's the general idea.

Exorcising Dragons

2010-04-19T23:33:00.006-04:00

"hanging its head in front of the most holy man, harmless and as if obedient"
"meek in spirit and with friendly noise"
"hanging its head, sobbing"
"it put its head on the ground"
"it humbly rolled its eyes, as if itwas feeling guilty and begging for mercy from him"
"it put its head down to the ground"
"like a pet dog"
"the dragon stood there like a sheep"
"that wildest of dragons left and hurried away and never appeared again anywhere"
"What more? The abominable dragon obeyed the saint's commands"

The dragon of D&D is typically the dragon of Tolkien and of Beowulf, the dragon that a hero must do battle with and slay. A fitting dragon for a world of adventurers. But not the only dragon of myth.

The dragon of many medieval legends is a creature of a world of God and the devil, and the dragon-slaying" legend of this world is a different kind of tale.

An itinerant saint arrives in a town, outsider to the community: a community suffering from the depredations and poisons of a dragon. The saint goes forth to the cave or pool where the dragon resides, often with townspeople following and observing. The saint calls forth the dragon from its dark place and in the name of God commands it: to go away from this place, to never again cause harm to people, even to die. The dragon is cowed by the saint and the name of the LORD and is subdued. The dragon has been vanquished.

I'll let Christine Rauer's treatment of the topic from her book, Beowulf and the dragon: Parallels and analogues, do the talking here:

Link to p. 71, in case the Google Book doesn't display properly.

Link to p. 72, in case the Google Book doesn't display properly.

Rauer's third chapter, "Dragon-Fights in Hagiography and Other Literature" is well worth reading in relation to this kind of dragon legend, as is the rest of the book for its masterful review of dragon-fight legendry.

This is not the dragon subdual of D&D, and I doubt these dragon myths had any particular influence on the introduction to "dragon subdual" into the game. But it does set a legendary and mythical precedent for dragon subdual of a different kind.

If I wanted to introduce this into a D&D game, I would do so through the closest analogue: the exorcist extraordinaire of the game itself, the Cleric. The Turning Undead tables in particular are rife for just this kind of application. One could easily expand these tables to include dragons (and demons and devils, for that matter) to better capture the resonance of these hagiographical tales. This works best thematically if dragons are simply dragons, not necessarily differentiated and catalogued into the familiar color-coded symmetry that has petrified over time (Zak's take, and E.G. Palmer's) .

I would be tempted to do something as simple as this:

Cleric vs. Dragon

Level of Cleric

Lesser Wyrm

Greater Wyrm

1

2

3

4

11

5

9

6

7

7

T

8

T

11

9

D

9

10

D

7

11+

D

T

This assumes that the DM will make a judgment call as to whether the dragon is a lesser or greater wyrm. I chose levels 4 and 8 as "breakpoint" levels because of their resonances with "Heros" and "Superheroes" in Chainmail and early D&D. The table assumes a "low level" world. Your Cleric vs. Dragons table might look very different.

Hat tip to The Geyhawk Grognard for prompting this post!

Gen Con 2010

2010-04-06T21:09:00.002-04:00

It's confirmed. I'll be back again this year. Anyone who wants to get together for a beer or a rainy city pick-up game at some point, let me know. I'll bring my usual travel bag for pick-up games (B/X D&D, The Fantasy Trip, and Street Fighter), and I'll be up for playing or running any of them when I'm not in other events and cruising the dealer hall.

The Rainy City Tour

2010-04-06T20:14:00.006-04:00

More about the rainy city from a friend's blog, Readying for Ragnarok.

Rickety and the Swells

2010-04-02T22:43:00.003-04:00

The Rainy City is surrounded by a tempest-wracked sea. Wretched salvage gangs, brazen pirates, and hardened monster-trawlers sail the storm swells to their own desperate ends. Reports from these mariners and the captains of refugee ships speak of nine great cycles in the storm and of the nine great waves encircling the city. Beyond the ninth wave, it is said, lies the end of all worlds.

It is by these waves that rainy city mariners navigate, such as they can.

Refugee ships are tossed into the outer swells by the maelstroms that have destroyed their home worlds. The storms of the Outer Swells are fiercest, smashing many ships before they even approach the refuge of the Rainy City. Out here there also are monsters: great serpents and demons of wind and wave and thunder. Those ships fortunate enough to survive this passage find no rest, for in the middle swells lurk pirates in fast cutters seeking treasures from lost worlds. Salvage crews pick up where they leave off.

Lost ships may spot a dim light among the waves and finally find hope for refuge.

But they will not find it in Rickety.

(Thanks to Warbeard for his newest contribution to the Rainy City!)

Images of the Rainy City

2010-03-29T21:27:00.005-04:00

Sometimes folks sketch at the game table, allowing me to bring you a few images from our rainy city games! These pictures are all courtesy of others -- thanks to Warbeard, Crazyred, and Lee for helping bring the game to life.

Vengus Ult, Alchemist (by Warbeard)

Jaelin the Charmer, Myrmidon-Warlock (by Warbeard)

Bartholomew the Bald, Priest and Clerk (by Crazyred)

Bartholomew the Bald (by Warbeard)

Kraul Geist, Burglar (by Warbeard)

Thevin Goon, Cutpurse (by Lee)

Thevin Goon's map of the Rainy City (by Lee)

Investigating the chests in the haunted ship (by Crazyred)

Bartholomew the Bald goes for a walk (by Crazyred)

Schwiller, boatman of the Nimbus Channel (by Warbeard)

Vassili, A Wizard of No Small Renown, some time after his... incident (by Warbeard)

Personalities of the Rainy City -- Part X

2010-03-21T17:05:00.002-04:00

Ah, the Grand Salon.

That renowned gathering of the finest minds of the wizardly elite, where the most impressive magical inventions of the past year are put on display, and where Mauvin the High Critic will declare the greatest of arcanopoetic artefact of the year. A fine occasion for camaraderie and collegiality. Yes, it is admittedly true that the salon often attracts base sorts who attempt to steal these great works of art from their rightful owners. Shameful! Such behavior is beneath the attention of true wizards, who would deign neither to engage in it or show concern about it. Let the Salon begin!

The Critical Trivium of the Grand Salon, Arbiters of Taste

Mauvin, the High Critic: His discernment is so far beyond that of the next man that it should be no surprise that his judgments are at times incomprehensible! What will he select this year as the greatest item of power and art? Last year it was Hyperion the Hated's fantastic Crystal Ovoid. This year? While Hyperion the Hated's entry has the advantage of not having been purloined, and it is hardly the case that Hyperion could have planned for the competitors' items to have been stolen, it would set a bad precedent.

Musca the Censor: A mysterious wizard who roams the sump in a tattered uniform, Musca the Censor decides! It is he who decides which topics of conversation are to be approved and which rejected. It is he who decides which ales from which taverns are to be approved and which rejected. He only need taste a pint of each to be sure! Musca ventures up to the Parliament House only for the Salon, at the request of the wise and unquestionable Mauvin the High Critic. For Musca can find flaw in any thing put before him -- a sure sign of his vast intellectual prowess.

Mirk the Dull: Not dull of mind -- dull of sheen! Mauvin's very presence drains the luster from everything and everyone around him. Yet his discernment must be sharp -- for he often agrees with Mauvin the High Critic, a sign that he too can see the true greatness in any thing that Mauvin has declared to be great.

Wizard Lords, High Necromancers, and True Magi with Work on Display in the Grand Hall

Dominian the Proscriptor: His entry in the Salon is a wand of many and divers wonders! Stinking clouds, flaming spheres, and more will be cast about the Grand Salon in Parliament House before the day is out! He comes with a crew of servants and apprentices fashionably dressed with masks of his very likeness. And he has some words for these, his trusted confederates and servants: His lifestyle requires money. I think you all know what he's saying. Make him proud!

Habitus Helveticus: Master of the fastest messenger service in the city, dashing through rain slicked streets without falter! Everyone knows what he will bring to the Salon, his newly minted boots of sprinting, striding, and springing. A bit crass, of course, to bring to the salon an invention he has already revealed to the public and used for base profit. His class is questionable.

Hyperion the Hated: A wizard of fire and flame, it is said. A rare gift in the rainy city! His entry in the Salon? A tattered cloak hanging within a magical case. Watch as he rudely raps the case! The cloak turns, and within it is full of eyes and teeth! A valuable security measure against thieves and theft. And who else among the wizards has actually created life! It is no matter that the cloak is wholly unlike the enchanted girdle he left in the vaults, where the magics were supposed to have been kept over night. And a good thing, for some scoundrel has stolen that girdle in the night.

Iambic Pentacular: The greatest wizard of the tower cliffs, by some estimations, not least by his own! His entry? The bowl! Peering into its waters calls forth a watery double of the wizard, to do his bidding about town in his absence. Why should a wizard of Iambic Pentacular's standing go outside and get his head wet. His watery double can do so! Its head is already wet!

Oculam the Oracular: He knows all. He sees all! Tonight at dinner, there will be potatoes! His invention? The "Tarpaulin of the Starry Sky." It is no wonder that Oculam is the greatest Astrologer in the city!

Petticroft Grue: No great wizard, good Petticroft, but the Grue family has been invited to the Salon since its earliest days. He could not in good taste be uninvited. And his entry in the Salon? A work of no little interest: a portable shadow! Truly it is a thing of wonder, albeit it of dubious utility.

Pizarro: A broken man since the fall of his steam baths at the hands of some petty rival who would certainly not have the gall to enter the salon himself. Pizarro's entry in the Salon this year? A scroll. Upon the scroll, the true name of a powerful demonic spirit of fire and flame, a salamander! A certain salamander, perhaps? But it is a shame that Pizarro forgot to lock up the scroll securely in the vaults, having absentmindedly left the door unlocked! Thieves and dangerous men may have stolen the scroll. How unfortunate for Pizarro! And how much more unfortunate for the salamander's current master!

Vassili, A Wizard of No Small Renown: The violent reptilian arm of doom that juts forth from the center of his chest, cruelly slashing at the air? That, it seems, is his entry. What does it do, you ask? It gets his hats back. Can it get other people's hats back? Other people's hats are of dubious quality.

Zaam the Alacritous: That business with his apprentice Jack and the sword that sent him on a killing spree? That was really all a terrible misunderstanding. The sword he is entering in the Salon this year, however, would do no such thing. It is a tiny token to be worn upon the neck as a fashionable accessory. It may grow to be a fine weapon of war, but it is certainly not as enthusiastic about war as the other blade.

Common Conjurers and Witches with Petty Displays in the Entry Hall

The Witch, Antigone Graves: No witches are allowed to enter the salon, and it is an act of great nerve to enter even the petty displays in the hall. No matter! The witch's so called "Rod of Cancellation" can hardly be an item of true power.

Phangol the Gallant: Inventor of the "purloin proof purse," he will sell you one for only the triflingest of fees.

Syntacticus the Deep: He stands before you to demonstrate a quill of inestimable mystery! It writes... but now where has the ink gone? A fine businessman such as yourself can certainly see its value. Purely for display in a frame on your office wall, of course!

Oster the Frog: His appearance? Unfortunate. His magic? Unusual! His petty display? An arrow which holds within it a single bolt of lightning he trapped by climbing the highest tree in the Sump and catching it! Why an arrow? He dropped his bottle, and was forced to improvise.

Johor the Gibbous: A silk rope, 50' in length. It coils. It uncoils. It climbs!

Garmoud, the Bloody Handed: He holds before you a stone. But not just any stone. A stone that would be the envy of many an alchemist. (Well, ok, not that stone. But it is a fine stone, nonetheless.)

Servants, Apprentices, and Ilk of Little Import

Apprentices, Servants, and Aides to the Great Wizards: A motley bunch, with shifty eyes and nimble fingers. Not at all fitting the bookish stereotype so many have of wizardly sorts. But the wizards claim them as their very own, and who would doubt the honesty of a wizard!

Vengus Ult: Alchemist-Philosopher, now turned apprentice to Dominian the Proscriptor? Truly this is a surprise! And where is the big jug of acid he always carries around? He didn't bring it with him.

Kshelek Stacks: Priest of indeterminate faith! He may not have all the answers, but he has pamphlets!

Jack: That business with the sword and the killing spree? He doesn't really like talking about it. No, he doesn't know what happened to the sword. Why do you ask?

A Nameless Wench Apprenticed to Zagyg the Eccentric: A female apprentice? One more reason to question Zagyg's judgment. Where is Zagyg the Eccentric, anyway? His apprentice assures you that he is indeed here to enter an item in the Salon. Perhaps you just missed him. She'll gladly pass your message on to him.

A Boy Apprentice to Oculam the Oracular: He is not a kid. He is fourteen years old and an apprentice. Pretty grown up.

A First Year Apprentice, Gray Haired and Bearded: Beneath his robes a fisherman's shirt. His hands rough and calloused. He assures you that his master has taught him the secrets to drawing the magic frentogram! And he is happy to share with you his smoking tobacco. It helps power the thaumatanergic energies, you know.

Sergeant Pollux: The Sergeant at Arms of Parliament House. His job? Simply to keep an eye on the apprentices and other lesser servants, who are of course trustworthy, as no true wizard would bring an untrustworthy fellow into the Parliament House. Still, he wouldn't be doing his job if he didn't keep an eye on the lot of them regardless.

Bartholomew the Bald: A most trusted and trustworthy clerk of the parliament, he is here simply to accompany the Sergeant and count things. Apprentices. Load-bearers. Servants. Works to be entered into the Salon and kept securely within the vaults until they are brought out for display. Yes, yes. In his humble judgment, everything appears to be accounted for.

Jaelin, the Charmer: With as many friends as Jaelin has, one might think he too would have warranted an invitation to the Grand Salon! Well perhaps he did, but good friend that he is, he instead agreed to watch over the home of Dominian the Proscriptor in his absence. In a wizard's absence, a house could be ransacked, after all!

A Foolish and Wicked Thing

2010-01-23T18:21:00.008-05:00

Even his wife's face seemed changed as he entered the room. It was white and expectant, and to his fears seemed to have an unnatural look upon it. He was afraid of her.
"Wish!" she cried, in a strong voice.
"It is foolish and wicked," he faltered.
"Wish!" repeated his wife.
He raised his hand. "I wish my son alive again."

W.W. Jacobs, "The Monkey's Paw," 1902

When the dead come back, they come back wrong. And the act of bringing them back is a crime against god. A terrible thing.

"The Monkey's Paw." Pet Sematary. "Herbert West -- Reanimator." Frankenstein. Vampires. Zombies. In their way, the central figures of "Scanners Live in Vain."

"...it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment." (Hebrews 9:27)

Bringing someone or something back from the dead will not -- can not -- turn out right.

Raising the dead is a form of necromancy.

Like many folks, I've always had mixed feelings about Raise Dead spells. Some DMs ban it. Others keep it as is, albeit begrudgingly. Others manage it by designing low level worlds with few high enough level priests to cast it, or by making it difficult to get access to in other ways. In a game as deadly as D&D can often be, raising the dead can allow for character continuity that might otherwise be lacking and can protect players from the loss of favored characters. But it's fair to say (and is often enough said) that it also cheapens death. After a certain point, character death becomes little more than a temporary setback. An annoyance, certainly. But not a truly significant event, in most cases.

Making the raising of the dead an act of necromancy in the campaign world is just another way to put a darker spin on this classic D&D trope, without taking it away completely. Perhaps the dead always come back changed -- chaotic and evil -- twisted versions of their former selves. Raisers of the dead are hated and feared, outcaste or untouchable, dangerous and hunted.

Necromancers.

Only the desperate and reckless would dare seek them out, the driven and dangerous dare to take upon themselves such power.

But what are adventurers if not desperate, reckless, driven, and dangerous...

Villainy

2010-01-07T22:57:00.004-05:00

Cobra Commander -- using girl scouts as human shields since 1982.

The Spelljammer post I don't have to write

2009-10-27T20:31:00.003-04:00

Noisms gets it.

Trad Spelljammer. The background music is Hawkwind, The Mars Volta, Pink Floyd, Monster Magnet, Klaatu, Ziggy Stardust, and weird Daft-Punk-esque French synth pop; the flavour art is stills from Ulysses 31 and Thundercats, the illithids are dressed like Marc Bolan. It's so naff that it has gone beyond naff into cool again. It's Spelljammer how God intended it, and it is really, really great.

Read the whole thing here.

Personalities of the Rainy City -- Part IX

2009-09-20T13:58:00.002-04:00

I'm obviously couple sessions (and weeks!) behind. So let's once again meet a few rogues and miscreants from the end of the world (with rain).

Jaelin the Charmer: This myrmidon-warlock is finely attired in gem encrusted armor which cost him a lot of money, so don't think he wants to get it scuffed up all the time. They call him "Jaelin the Charmer" for a reason. People like him. They like him for real.

Vengus Ult: Once more he has elected to promote himself, now to the rank of magnus. He is not an overly ambitious man. He just wants to go see what's in those sarcophaguses. Sarcophagi? Alright, he just wants to go see what's in those coffins.

Kshelek Stacks: Priest and investigator of the Affiliated Orders of the Pangnostic Cohesion, he is newly arrived in the rainy city researching the possibility that the secret of a weird conspiracy of the halflings might be found here. Which is to say, he doesn't know that such a conspiracy exists. Nor does he know that it might be found here. But he doesn't know that it doesn't exist, nor is there evidence that it couldn't be found here. Thus it clearly warrants further investigation.

Miker: A youthful coachman for Banthus's Elite Coaches, student in the autodidactic mode, with a major in philosophies both of the natural and the humane.

Dominian the Proscriptor! Master of the Gurgling Death! His manse on Tower Cliffs lies empty. It is said by some that he sailed away one dark night and has never returned. What treasures lie within those halls?

Dominian the Proscriptor's Backyard! Over the wall, it smells of wet dog and sulphur. Perhaps the front gate would be a better choice.

Mester Padfoot: Dependable halfling butler for Dominian the Proscriptor, Mester Padfoot lives in a small hill in Dominian's garden and comes into the house to bake fine hob cakes and see to the day-to-day operations of the manse. He is an old friend of Jaelin's, as so many fine people in the rainy city. Mester is rather used to Dominian's comings and goings, his long absences and briefly befuddled returns. He is quite sure that his employer will show up again. Until such time, he knows how to pay the manse's bills.

A Gang of Three-eyed, Purple Skinned Goblins: Unnatural creatures of sorcery, obviously. Not very good conversationalists.

Seventeen Dancing Automata: Some stand broken in the grand ballroom. Others whirl awkwardly past their broken down brethren and their treasured hearts. All bear the noble features of Dominian the Proscriptor.

The Librarians: A goat chewing on the pages of a book. A fat black spider in a web in the shelves. Something moving just past your peripheral vision. A fat-bellied imp with a barbed black tail. These are the librarians of Dominian the Proscriptor. They will gladly help you with information and book loans -- readily even -- if you would only just review and sign this contract with a bit of blood.

The Bedroom Poltergeist: This bedchamber is a mess of broken lamps, smashed chairs, and ruffled blankets. Even the dresser has been tossed over in disarray. Enter at your own risk!

The Screaming Skull: Earsplitting. Endless, even when the skull itself is shattered. You really shouldn't have disturbed Dominian the Proscriptor's spell component pantry.

Ussa: A beautiful water spirit, she lives in a pond in a chamber beneath the manse. No, she doesn't like to leave. Robbers might come in. Yes. And steal her pond.

A Tentacled Thing: It lives beneath the black waters in a natural cavern abutting Dominian's möbius dungeon. What does it guard? Well, there is the living cavern art gallery filled with priceless watery Dominians. Also a cavernous waterfall that might be a way out.

Twelve Corpses of Dominian the Proscriptor: Twelve sarcophaguses line the walls of the room, each holding a mummified corpse of Dominian the Proscriptor. Each wears Dominian's finest robes. Each wears Dominian's finest jewelry.

Dominian the Proscriptor: Returned, as predicted, this time wearing glittering gem-encrusted armor. Dominian the Proscriptor cannot die. He simply takes an occasional vacation. To get his thoughts in order.

Special thanks for part of this adventure (the dungeon beneath Dominian's manse) goes to Justin Alexander for his one-page dungeon, "Halls of the Mad Mage."

Personalities of the Rainy City -- Part VIII (Gen Con Edition!)

2009-08-23T00:40:00.002-04:00

Another miscellany of rogues, scoundrels, miscreants, and lowlifes of the rainy city.

Bartholomew the Bald: Curate Clerk in the wizard's parliament. Balding and meek, utterly harmless. A trustworthy man, if only because he is far too timid to be devious, and of course is entirely lacking in cunning. Yes, it is odd that he always seems to know everyone's comings and goings, their appointments and travels. But even the dull need a hobby. No one would ever take notice of his comings and goings, nor find it remarkable if he were to leave his parliament office an hour early one rainy afternoon.
The Lodge of the White Wizard: Some say the White Wizard is a demigod, some an angel. Some say a mortal who ascended to immortality! Whispered rumors claim that he will one day save the world, returning light to the rainy city. Others say he is little more than the pipe dream of besotted necromancers. Whatever the truth, this much is certain: the White Wizard could well save or destroy the city, for initiates of his lodge can be found in administrative and clerical positions at all levels of government.
The Ransom -- A Ship Returning from the Outer Swells: Word came to the parliament some short time ago -- tantalizing rumors of a treasure beyond imagining to be found among the crashing waves of the outer storm where even pirates and salvage crews fear to sail. Rumors so great that even the wizard's parliament was moved to quick and decisive action. The Ransom, the fastest ship of the fleet, was dispatched immediately! And this afternoon, The Ransom returns...
Fargun Rasstead: Professional liberator of treasures, and sharper of good reputation. Always cool, her look of dull confusion lulls the unwary into underestimating her. When she speaks, she always questions, probing for information that few would willingly reveal, hiding her investigations in queries which sound stumbling, banal, even obvious. Masterful!
Crassius the Crass: A whispered legend within accounting circles, the subject of much rumor and hearsay. His very presence makes any social gathering awkward. His name alone is enough to draw disapproving glances and uncomfortable fidgeting from his colleagues. Abacumancer and calculator extraordinaire, he has often been heard to remark, "This just doesn't f _ _ king add up!"
Vangrid of the Obscuring Eye: Widely recognized as the master of the arts of obfuscation and perplexity, this enchanter would be even more widely recognized if only anyone knew what he looked like. Only the rains parting around him attest to his presence as he passes in the street. Some go so far as to say that he is no man at all, but in fact a ghost or specter of some sort.
Vengus Ult: His apothecary shop at the edge of the wharves must be doing exceedingly well. So many customers pass through its doors, from the highest levels of government to the lowliest stevedores of the docks! A remarkable thing for a man who does not sell true alchemies, but only tinctures and unguents (which must be of the highest order). Recent rumors that he has taken up necromancy and the conjuring of spirits are baseless slanders!
Jaelin the Charmer: Swashbuckler enchanter, the only elf to stride among mankind in the rainy city. Always well-liked, he is a fashion trend-setter. Purple capes are sure to become all the rage now that he flies over the city wearing one.
Hesperia: Hesperia's occupation is uncertain. Shipping agent, perhaps? Shipwright? Saleswoman in the ship businesses? Well, something to do with ships. Why should she be meeting with a gang of ruffians and scofflaws? This at least is obvious: if you aren't willing to work with dubious characters, you are bound to have a short career in the business world of the rainy city.
Marko Durban: Professional rebel outlaw and odd jobs man. Frequent visitor to Hesperia's unassuming little ship at the edge of the docks, he now has a whole gang of outlaws at his behest.
Neezur Killroy: Member of Marko Durban's crew. In his shining plate mail, and with his silent grim countenance, he is obviously Mr. Durban's bodyguard and hired killer.
Celendra: Member of Marko Durban's crew. Lithe and quick, it is said that Celendra may be one of the many aliases of the rogue Fargun Rasstead. Perhaps even Rasstead's true identity? As always with this duplicitous scoundrel, nothing can be said for certain. Why she is working with Marko Durban's crew is a mystery. Unless perhaps she is the crew's secret mastermind, and Marko Durban is little more than a frontman.
Geezur: Member of Celendra's crew. Unassuming in appearance, bald and wrinkled, his appearance readily gives him away: he is obviously a cracksman and locksmith of the highest skill.
Ozur: The fifth member of Celendra's gang, introduced by Mr. Durban as Geezur's brother. Yet no one can describe him! Some say he was only Geezur's shadow. Others say he is a thief of such skill that he is only seen from the side, in the shadows, or looking away, no matter where you are standing when you look at him.
Elenia the Smuggler: A trustworthy transporter of sensitive goods, she is seeing remarkably brisk business these days. It is rumored that she is now doing business with even more unsavory sorts than is usual, a fact well-attested by the presence of Celendra's gang and some very unsavory stevedores near her ship recently.
Scaev: Sailor, mercenary marine, and occasional were-shark. In the face of a very friendly greeting from Jaelin the Charmer, Scaev revealed his villainy by assaulting this otherwise very well-liked gentleman. It is a mystery what Jaelin could possibly have done to deserve such poor treatment.
A Dozen Drunken Sailors: Overcome by a touch of mid-afternoon fatigue, they fell to sleeping upon the docks shortly after Scaev charged. Fights on the docks are commonplace. Naps less so. A new religious ritual, perhaps? Drugs? Weird magics?
Five Stevedores: Big, rough looking stevedores carrying what look like two bodies wrapped in carpets. They have a delivery of... flowers... for a Mr. Marko Durban, at this address.
Plague Victims in the Regalia of The Ransom: Plague ravaged corpses washed up against the boatman's landing of the Guild District. They wear uniforms of the sailors of The Ransom, and one even wears the tricorn of the First Mate. The plague has come to town. This is not the treasure that was promised.
Middle Class Partiers out for a Night on the Town: They huddle together beneath their umbrellas, looking politely away from the plague-ridden corpses near the landing. Their conversation remains unperturbed.
Quintas: Beneath the roof of his fine boat sit often the dignitaries of town. Tonight is no different! The Sergeant-at-Arms himself rides out to his nightly patrol.
The Sergeant-at-Arms of Parliament: A man of such natural discernment and acuity that he appears to do little more than repose himself comfortably with a sputtering pipe. Yet if anything is amiss, he would notice. His actions are decisive! In the face of obvious evidence of plague, he orders The Ransom quarantined. Savior of the city once again.
Spirits of the Dead: First, The Ransom is embraced by a chill fog. Then two pale apparitions arise from the sea. Is it any wonder that the sailors choose to spend no more time upon its deck?
Superstitious Sailors: These men have braved the outer swells, risking life and limb to take a ship where ships dare not sail! Their courage is unquestioned. But they were not hired to cavort with haunts and spirits.
Dominian the Proscriptor: A huge bellied wizard in a huge flowing robe, his mouth turned down, his right eyebrow cocked dubiously. He is here to investigate the ship, as the right and proper representative of the parliament. Do not doubt his power! Do as he orders, or he will strike you down with the Gurgling Death! You know he can do it! Because of that time, with the guy. Do you dare test him?

Ah, Gen Con...

2009-08-18T21:03:00.004-04:00

Gen Con was great fun. It quickly ramped up to "too busy to post updates with the phone," and the post con work blitz has kept me occupied since. So here are a few quick thoughts and memories.

First things first: I had a blast playing a Rainy City game with Crazyred of D&D Doodle and his gang of ruffians on Friday night. As soon as time opens up in my schedule, I'll have a "personalities of the rainy city post" about the session.

Also had fun playing in Zachary Houghton of RPG Blog II's "Smash n' Grab at Kobold Caverns" game Saturday morning. The pre-gen characters had exactly the right amount of characterization -- a catchy concept, a note about why they might be after the gold, and clever assignment of equipment. I drew the town sheriff, and it was a piece of cake to hit the ground running with him. PatrickWR of RPG Diehard took home the most treasure as the town's halfling baker.

Got in a Pathfinder game Saturday afternoon. I think I may have more to say about this in the future, but one thing really leapt out at me during the session. The structure of play really wasn't all that different from the morning game from the player's seat. Musing on this.

Didn't manage to fit in a D&D 4 game, even though it probably should have been easy. I've been meaning to try it out, but I just didn't find a spot for it.

Now that I've had some time to look everything over, I think I can say my favorite products that I bought at the con are Rhialto's Book of Marvels (for The Dying Earth RPG), 3:16 Carnage Amongst the Stars, and How to Host a Dungeon. I also picked up a great selection of GURPS books to use with The Fantasy Trip (e.g., "GURPS Bestiary," "GURPS Fantasy Bestiary," "GURPS Low Tech," and "GURPS Arabian Nights") and grabbed the complete 3 volume "Priest's Spell Compendium" from the AD&D 2e era. These books will all get plenty of use.

In general, the best thing about the con is probably the people. I like nerds. Sure, there are some folks with real problems, including poor hygiene, that I'm not willing to ignore. But for the most part, Gen Con just strikes me as a place full of enthusiasm. The attendees are enthusiastic. The costumes are crazy cool, even though they're not always very good. (Yes, I even like bad costumes.) The exhibitors are usually great to meet, even though they're working their asses off the whole con and sleeping very little. The artists are especially easy to hang out and talk to. I can't wait to go next year. I have a bunch of new games I'm positively excited about playing, and I met a bunch of people I'm looking forward to seeing again.

I call that a success.

Level of Cleric	Lesser Wyrm	Greater Wyrm
1
2
3
4	11
5	9
6	7
7	T
8	T	11
9	D	9
10	D	7
11+	D	T