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The Hill Cantons Cosmology “Appendix N”

June 18, 2013, 11:08 am
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One for the “showing my work” file, some of the inspiration points that went into the religion and cosmology series. Another post on the terrifying inimical gods of the Anti-Cantons may be in the making.

Poul Anderson's The Broken Sword and Three Hearts and Three Lions, Douglas Bachmann's Dragon article in #40 (the Weird and its cosmic juxtaposition to human civilization, the association of humanity with Law, the waxing/waning of gods being tied to the amount of human worship and the reduction of “Faerie”)


Jack Vance's Lyonesse, Dying Earth, and Planet of Adventure novels (absurdist satire of religious mores, weird gods and weirder religious doctrine)

Leiber's Lankhmar stories especially “Lean Times in Lankhmar” (more satire, petty gods and apotheosis)

Counter-Reformation Catholicism, Mediterranean hero-cults, Hellenistic and Roman sun-cults, Theosophy, Jewish neoplatonism and mystical traditions, Piper's Lord Kalvan, Early Christian theological disputes (Sun Lord sects, Ha-Vul the Antagonist and to a lesser extent the Silent God)

Hussites (and Taborites), Mormon feminist views on the Heavenly Mother, William Blake's poetic mythology around the Triple Goddess(The Celestial Lady and her secret heretical societies)

Slavic folklore and pagan mythology (Pahr Old Gods, folk customs, and a number of godlings)

Hindu and Native American creation myths (World Turtle)

M.A.R Barker's Create a Religion In Your Spare Time for Fun and Profitand Mitlanyal (general inspiration, the concept of distinct aspects for gods)

Gary Gygax's article on Five-Fold Alignmentin Strategic Review.

Robert Graves's White Goddess and Mary Renault's Theseus books (the Mistress of the Mountains and the religion of the Kaftors)

Occultist and Slavic Neopagan theories and art  (Hyperborean origins)

Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborean cycle (Youndeh and other elements)

The Eternals comic Jack Kirby (space gods, duh)   
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Attention By This Axe PDF Purchasers

June 19, 2013, 10:31 am
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One of those “how did I get this far into the party with spinach stuck in my teeth with no one telling me” moments. The full-color Bilibin cover for By This Axe that I had intended for both the print and PDF versions hasn't been showing up in merged in the PDF version (though it does appear on my publisher preview).

Since it was my intention to provide said cover, if you have purchased a copy of the PDF before today (the new revised version online now should have a cover merged in) drop me an email at kutalik at the gmail dot com with your Lulu receipt (you can excise info if that doesn't make you comfortable) and I will send you a copy of the new file AND automatically email you a copy of the two free supplements when they come out.

Mea culpa.


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From the Sunken Lands to the Feral Shore

June 20, 2013, 8:47 am
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A couple of weeks ago I had the great fortune of scoring an affordable copy of a Holy Grail product I have been patiently searching for a good long while now: Midkemia Press's Heart of the Sunken Lands.

Though like many so-called Petalheads (thanks, Scott) I get my rage on for the Tekumel lifting by Raymond Feist, the setting's popularizer, I have a great love of the actual gaming products they put out with all their interesting sandbox subsystems (the encounters and down-time business in Cities in particular) and eye for nestling those systems in colorful setting specific ways.

With Rudy Kraft--co-designer of the gold standard for wilderness sandboxes, Griffin Mountain—listed as the author of Sunken Lands I figured it had to be a solid piece of work.

I wasn't disappointed.

The book lays out (with a nifty four-panel blank players' map) a first-class wilderness sandbox set in a large, mountain-ringed, jungle-choked depression. The product has a lot of depth with many pages being devoted to navigation/exploration of the unique range of terrains; inventive, non-standard creatures, plants, gems, extractable resources, and humanoids; an expeditions table (lifted from my favorite section of their Jonril books) that hardwires in an interesting range of incentives for player exploration; and a couple mysterious sites.

With my eponymous campaign now shifting for the moment to the exploration, clearing and possible colonization of a wilderness region called the Feral Shore (more about that later) what I found most intriguing were the subsystems for wilderness exploration (apparently planned for a never-published Midkemia wilderness supplement). I found them highly inspirational and instantly set down to custom fit them to the new mini-campaign.
What the Feral Shore looked like 500 years ago
before being wiped out of existence by the Turko-Fey
The outline of that system (redacted to not tip off the players over much) I share below.

Feral Shore Exploration and Movement
What's different from the typical D&D systems:
  1. Movement is calculated by the hour instead of by the day.
  2. Encounter checks are done by the hex rather than by time.
  3. Encounters cover a wider range of events than the typical wandering monster-like check. Interesting plants, mineral deposits, geographical features, run-in's with sentient beings, strange sites etc are included on tables specific to the terrain of the hex.
  4. Checks are also made on a Mishap table per hex (includes such things as getting lost, having a horse go lame, equipment break, inclement weather, etc.)
  5. Speed matters. A party moving at a slower speed will have an increased chance of hitting an encounter but a decreased chance of having a mishap.

Movement Speeds
Exploration 6 average hours/day
Cautious, Encumbered or Party over 50 8 average hours/day.
Normal 10 average hours/day.
Traveling Light or Forced March 12 average hours/day.

Assumption for Normal travel
Foot: STR 8-14 character can hump 25-40 lbs of gear in pack and pouches, armor of chain/half-plate or less, two weapons, shield. Weaker character -10 lbs, Stronger character +10 lbs
Mounted: Horse can hump 150-250 lbs normally (total includes rider and related gear). Mule 200-300 lbs.

Foot: Average Miles per Hour (includes breaks)
Terrain Road/TrailOverland
Grasslands, Fields2.52
Light Woods, Scrub21.5
Grassy Hills or Moor21.5
Scrub or Rocky Hills1.51
Deep Forest1.51
Forested or Steep Hills1.5
Coastal Wetlands1.5
Swamp or Heath1.5
Badlands1.5
Mountain.75.25

Horse/Mule:

Terrain Road/TrailOverland
Grasslands, Fields54
Light Woods, Scrub43
Grassy Hills or Moor43
Scrub or Rocky Hills32
Deep Forest2.5.5
Forested or Steep Hills1.5.25
Coastal Wetlands1.5.25
Swamp or Heath1.5.25
Badlands1.5.25
Mountain1.50

Encounter Chart example
Light Woods: Encounter on roll of 1 on a d10. +2 if moving at Exploration, +1 at Cautious, -1 at Fast.
Roll d10
1-3Roll on standard D&D Wilderness Encounter
4Human or Sentient Neutral
5-6Normal Animal
7Plant
8Mineral
9Site
10Weird



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Homebrewing and the Tabletop Origins of King of Dragon Pass

June 24, 2013, 12:51 pm
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Rereading this morning the interview I did with David Dunham, the creator of the brilliant King of Dragon Pass (after blogging for five years I find myself forgetting the details of my own copy), it struck me that one of the things—besides the charming hand-drawn artwork, deep setting and challenging game play—that makes the game great and not just merely good is that it evolved in part out of two creative DIY-tinkering tabletop campaigns.
Clan Raiding scene [Source: King of Dragon Pass wiki]
If you remember (or if you are just tuning in) Dunham had played in the 90s in “The Taming of Dragon Pass”, a tabletop campaign run by Jeff Richards, chief editor of Glorantha's most recent home Moon Design Publications. That campaign ran off a home-brewed system called PenDragon Pass, a hack of Pendragon rpg and Runequest. (You can check out a partial version here on Dunham's website and a full version in Enclosures #1if you are lucky bastard)

Mash-up seems inadequate, synthesis is the better word, as Pendragon Pass takes an unusual campaign premise, modeling small-scale “domain game” activity centuries before the usual Glorantha canonical setting, bending the elements of the two games with a great array of new subsystems and variant rules.

Here is a whole mini-game on cattle raiding, there an adaption of the Arthurian traits and glory system to a more organically Gloranthan system. You have the grafting simplified RQ magic system and the generations-long saga system of Pendragon noble family life into an Orlanthi clan system.

There's a simplified variant skill system working off of a d20 with a new skills appropriate to the colonizing/warring backdrop. The Enclosure version (yes, I know a lucky bastard) has a tight, interesting character generation system, an exploration mini-game and a bunch of other lovable chrome.

Fans of the computer game may recall a scene when some pre-Roman looking Briton types, exotic but still Orlanthi tribesmen from the distant west, come rolling up in open-walled chariots. That scene seems to be a bit of an easter egg homage to an East Ralios campaign by Dunham again using PenDragon Passwith further customization to fit the particular cultural and religious features of that other region.

Both accounts fire all my gaming pistons and strike me as a fully-realized vision of the kind of backwards engineering that me and my comrades in the DIY wing of the so-called OSR love to do: take crazy, individualized worldbuilding visions and bend, break and mutilate all the elements of our favorite games until they fit. (Sometimes the process works exactly in the opposite direction, with the mad tinkering informing the shape of the world, but I think you get my drift.)

That kind of spirit—when it works at the table—can create a vitality and freshness to the game. Further having some roots in the open “who knows what's going to happen” kind of play that is more typical of tabletop than that of the storyboarding lock-step of most modern crpgs grown purely in staff meetings.

Or maybe I'm just rationalizing breaking my self-imposed ban on computer games (again) as I fire up the PC version for the umpteenth time?  
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Religion and the Hill Cantons Part Four: The Hero-Cult of Adalfuns

June 27, 2013, 9:33 am
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Hero-cults of the Sun Lord play an important role in the confusing panorama of religious life of the Solarity-holding people of Zem (see this post for background). The cult of Adalfuns the Choate is one such aspect held dear by even the heretically-minded in the Hill Cantons.

The Chant of Adalfuns the 37thAspect of our Sun Lord Puissant
In the Free City (then, as now, a misnomer) of Aufhebensplota in the August Year of the Noxal Surrender (or 41,069) was born the hero Adalfuns, the love child of the cow maiden Welga and our most beloved and virile of divine presences, the Sun Lord--who is also by way of the shared godhead also Adalfuns.

Though his adolescent years were spent happily if rowdily knocking the jaunty caps off of local dilettantes and earning the inexplicable nickname of “Wonder Hans” with the local maidens, the wanderlust that runs raging in his divine veins took his course and he struck out from home for the Path of Heroes: helping other beings in shuffling their mortal coils and the carting away of their possessions.

So it came to pass that Adalfuns entered the Hill Cantons in search of the Horned Oracle. Crossing the River Trvna on the road to Ostrovo he was startled to hear a great stirring of the water behind. Glancing over his magnificently broad shoulder he saw the hairy, horned mass of the bukavac hovering mid-air.

“What ho, bukavac?' Adalfuns cried. “why do you make ready to leap upon my rippled and ample back?”

“I lack sustenance and wish to dine upon the delectable substance called man-fat,” answered the bukavac reasonably.

“Surely my toned and muscular form would provide poor and gamey fare to your refined, if monstrous palate.”

“Ah but that is where we differ, oh man-flesh on the foot,” answered the bukavac, “I have found delight in the prodigious marbling of a well-seasoned fighting man.”

“I will happily share in my man-fat, but for a contest of logical conundrums. If you win, you crush beneath your mass and consume the entirety of my body. If I win, I shall lop off my right arm and present it to you. In either case your avaricious belly finds nourishment.”

“While I take exception to the libelous characterization of my abdomen, I agree to such a contest.”

As Adalfuns began his exposition his dextrous hands sought out unseen contents from his magic backpack (of which it is said that the desired item always laid on top).

“Baromil wears a scarlet doublet on Sunlorday, Jirimil wears a black one on Blackgoatday and Alena wears a woolen wimple twice a week. Timosz is wearing a burgonet. What day of the week is it?”

“That make entirely no sense,” said the bukavac in an exasperated tone. “I shall make ready to leap upon your ample back.”

“Oh no, wait there is a second part,” said Adalfuns as he hurriedly and steathily whittled behind his back. “There is a blood apricot-laden cart leaving Heimotbuch traveling at four cantonal potato-leagues an hour while another such laden cart leaves Muth travelling at two leagues per hour. Where and when do the two carts meet.”

“But again...” Before the thoroughly confused and enraged bukavac could ready his banter, Adalfuns took the 10-foot sharpened stick from behind his back and thrust it into the gleaming red of the great beast.

“Sweet fuck,” said the bukavac in tremendous pain. “You have blinded and cheated me.”

“But that was exactly my point,” quipped Adalfuns in a line that sounded good on his tongue at the time, but on further reflection later seemed cheap and breezy. Whistling a saucy tune he hitched up his pack and made way to Ostrovo for a steaming pile of halushky.

A: Chaotic, Good (one of the few aspects of the Sun Lord so)
B: +1 to hit when using a piercing weapon (3), +1 to surprise if engaged in conversation with a being before combat (6).
C: Fighters, Rangers, Fey exiles from New Hampshire

D: See the Sun Lord.
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Reavers of the Weird: a By This Axe Mini-Campaign

July 2, 2013, 2:16 pm
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A recent idea by Deep Evan to run a wargame side counterpart to his Dark Country rpg one has fired me up for designing sections of the campaign supplement By this Axe(my medieval fantasy battle rules set).

Below is a free mini-campaign for 2-4 players to be used with BTA's battle and draft skirmish rules (drop me a line for a copy of that, it will only make sense if you have a copy of BTA). The campaign is hard-wired to have some interesting trade-offs against a small-scale warfare backdrop. Do I send out a small raiding party with less chance of getting caught—and less chance of creating havoc? Or do I send out the big guns? How should I spread my forces to guard my precious pigs and other assets?

Background and Set-Up
Countless centuries of gavelkind succession laws have cranked up the fractionalizing, autarkic, hair-splitting pettiness—so typical of life in places with a foot in the Weird--to a feverish pitch in the Translittoral Canton of Hoimatbuch. That chilly, windy easternmost bastion of the Overkingdom is further plagued by a strangely-virile nobility creating a maddening over-proliferation of hyphen-crazy micro-fiefdoms as each holding is divided equally among the male children of each line.

You are the holder of one of these tiny sub-divided micro-states, your neighbor is a similar such asshole. You both want to kill and take each other's stuff, but are limited to the rules of low-intensity warfare that the Overking imposes.

Each player as part of his squalid little holding receives 30 pigs in his sties, 20 horses in his corrals, a village filled with tax-paying chumps, three blood-apricot orchards, a swollen (yet strangely beautiful) prize pig, a fine Southlands horse, and a charming (almost), rustically-decorated, black-timbered manor house. Ridding your opponent of his assets being the object of the campaign.

Each player receives 250 points to buy their initial retinue. Each band receives one Wildgraf or Boyar (that's you) and one Lieutenant for free. All figures must be grouped into units of two or more figures (who represent five warriors each) on their roster.


Forces Available
Wildgraf or Boyar (Hero-General)
Fighting Capacity: 5, Armor Save 4(s), Heavy Armor, Shield, Lance, Sword, Horse (lose this if fine horse stolen in raid).

Reaver Lieutenant (Hero-Leader)
Fighting Capacity: 5, Armor Save 4(s), Heavy Armor, Shield, Lance, Sword, Horse

Reaver Lancer (light raiding cavalry, cost 25),
FC: 3, AS: 2 (s), Light Armor, Shield, Lance, Javelins, Sword, Horse

Reaver Foot (light raider-archers, cost 15)
FC: 3, AS: 1, Light Armor, Longbow, Sword

Dopplesoldiers (landsknecht foot, cost 12)
FC: 3, AS: 2, Medium Armor, Pike or Two-Handed Sword

Men-at-Arms (mercenary foot, cost 9)
FC: 2, AS: 2, Medium, Polearm

Crossbowman (merc foot, cost 9)
FC: 2, AS: 1, Light, Light Crossbow, Sword

The Campaign Turn
Each turn (roughly a fortnight) the player can elect to mount 0-2 offensive actions (see below) and as many defensive actions as he cares. All actions are considered to occur simultaneously. The campaign ends after six turns and victory points are computed.

Offensive Actions
Each turn can assign a leader or general and accompanying units to conduct a raid (each force must have a leader). He picks one of the options from below.
Pig Raid
Steal Horses
Humiliate Villagers
Burn Blood-Apricot Orchards
Raze Manor

Defensive Actions
Each turn the player also assigns his non-raiding units (again each must have two or more to various locales.
Assign Guards to Pig Sties
Assign Guards to Horse Corral
Assign Guards to Village
Assign Guards to Orchard
Assign Guard to Manor house
Assign Reserve (assign figures to serve as a reserve for pursuits and defense)
Buy Reinforcements (useable once per turn gain 30 points of figures, see Victory Point penalty)

Raid Resolution
Opposition
Raider rolls d6 when on a raid to see what resistance she faces. Battles involving 4 or less figures per side will be resolved with the BTA draft skirmish rules. Battles involving more than that with the full mini battle rules. After a battle or skirmish, the victor regains all routing forces, the loser only a third.
Modifiers:
-1 Raiding Force has 1-4 figures
-1 Raiding Force all mounted
+1 Raiding Force has 11 and over figures
0- Get Away Scot Free (Roll on Plunder)
1Escape with No Plunder (No Effect)
2-3Fight Locale Guard Only (Victorious Raider Rolls for Plunder)
4Fight Locale Guard and 30% of Reserve (Victorious Raider Rolls for Plunder)
5Fight Locale Guard and 60% of Reserve (Victorious Raider Rolls for Plunder)
6+Fight Locale Guard and 100% of Reserve
Plunder
Victorious raider roll a d6 on the follow charts.
Modifiers:
-1 Raiding Force has 2-4 figures
+1 Raiding Force has 11 and over figures

Pig or Horse Raid
1-Nothing stolen
2-31d6 animals stolen
42d6 animals stolen
53d6 animals stolen
6+3d6 animals stolen plus Prize Pig or Fine Horse

Village Humiliation
1-Local folk laugh and ask “is that all you got?”
2Village idiot forced to wear Eld helmet
3Blacksmith tarred and feathered
4Village headman (notable) cuckolded
5Local temple Sun Lord priest (notable) beard shaved
6+Relative of Boyar (notable) speckled with dung

Orchard Burning
1-3Fire doesn't catch
4-5Orchard burned
6+Fire spreads to other orchard. Two orchards burned.

Manor Razing
1-3Broke a window, take that. Minor to no damage.
4-6Trashed the place. Manor partially destroyed. If previously partially damaged then manor is completely destroyed (bummer)

Victory Points
Add up after six turns. The highest score wins.
+1 VP for each pig in possession
+2 VP for each horse
+5 VP for each Prize Pig or Fine Horse
-2 VP for each village commoner of yours humiliated
-3 VP for each village notable of yours humiliated
-5 VP for each reinforcement taken
-5 VP for each orchard burned
-5 VP for partially destroyed manor house
-15 VP for razed manor house
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Support RPG Micropublishing on the Cheap This Week

July 4, 2013, 8:11 am
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It's the Fourth of July, time to belabor some cliches and support the indy side of our hobby. While the Kickstarter boom/bubble/scourge (take your pick) grabs much of the spotlight there has also been a bit of an explosion from DIYers and micro-publishers

And what's more you can do it as a cheap ass this week with deep discounts at Lulu. The discount code of FIREWORKS will save you 25% (only today and tomorrow). And JULYBOOKS13 will get you 20% after that. 

But wait there's more. I will discount the print versions of By This Axe and the Hill Cantons Compendium by 10% for the rest of the week: 35% off (with the same amount going to charity). Find all that here.

While you are splurging, here's a list of some other fine rpg purveyors of the weird and wonderful:
Mike Davison, Ruins & Ronin
Scott Moberly, AFS magazine 
Trey Causey, Weird Adventures
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Settling the Feral Shore

July 23, 2013, 8:19 am
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It's been quiet here blogside as of late, real world business, writing and gaming (ironically) have conspired to delay my triumphant return into regular blogging. (But really how much is there to say about a hobby?)

Besides the Reavers of the Weird miniatures campaign which launched this week with six players, the weekly Hill Cantons game has been going in some interesting directions in the new explore/clear/colonize the Feral Shore sideline. In other words doing domain-level play several levels before "name level" and firmly shaking out the notion that it is some kind of end-game retirement phase. 

A thriving (if squalid) little Jamestown-like fort settlement has sprung up and the players have already accomplished some rather heroic (for their general murderhobo scumbaggery) feats such as freeing an old pagan god chained to a lakefloor (who they think is the Cantons version of the Slavic god Veles), finding a book of a god, clearing a massive dam made wholly of human bones, exploring the Valley of Grot and its temple, etc.

As the foothold in the Weird expands, I find myself adapting many of the collection of subsystems designed for the two Domain Game experiments and the Borderlands (yeah, yeah eventually). Here is one of the ones I am currently using to set out what kind of broke-in-the-head people would be attracted to a muddy little clearing in the howling wilderness.

Settler Rules
Colonists can recruited to the settlement by the promise of free or cheap land. Colonists will only begin to arrive when the following conditions are met:
1. A two-mile hex and it's surrounding hexes have been rigorously explored and cleared of threats.
2. The players have set twice a week patrols of all six of those hexes.
3. The passage from the coast to the settlement is also explored, cleared, and patrolled.

Every three months a call can be issued back home in the Cantons. With each seasonal call, the player can grant and settle up a square miles of arable land in the settlement hex. Each hex is assumed to have four square miles of potentially grantable land.

Colonists work their own land and provide their own means, thus the players have no direct obligation to house, feed, and pay them as they do for their retainers, hirelings, and followers. They do however come under the obligation of paying taxes, tithes, fees, tariffs and obeying the rules set by the players within reason. An average rate of taxation—1 gold sun per family per month--will tend to not produce riotous conditions.

Roll on the following two tables for each seasonal settlement (or if a special campaign event calls for it).

Interesting Immigrants Table
Roll d20
1Crazy old coot
2Village idiot
3Local gossip (also practices some kind of trade)
41d3 wanton harlots or strutting gigolos
5Slave trader/Indentured Servant dealer or other scum bag, 1d3 slimy henchmen
6 Tavern/Wine den/Hallucinogen parlor keeper
7Smelly kozak horse caravanserai and trade herd
8Evening or Morning Star society heretic (also craftsmen)
9Starry Void mystic (also craftsmen)
10Silent God rebbe or Old Pahr pagan (also vinter, metalsmith, or sage)
11Feral Dwarf hill scout
12Half-Ogre goon
13Black Hobbit professional maker of trouble
14Fishing boatkeeper and family (or hunter if not on navigable water)
15Recovering (perhaps) bandit/outlaw/poacher
16Kezmaroki shabby gentily family (extravagant title but destitute)
171d3 defaulted Bonders (mercs) from Kezmarok (come with armor and weapons)
18Guild of Condoterrie, Linkboys and Scalawags member (owes back dues)
19Non-inimical monster from the Weird
20 Something truly fucked up (GM's discretion).


Boring Immigrants Table
Roll d10
1none
2-316 families of tenant farmers
4-514 families of tenant farmers, 2 families of freeholders (80 suns for sale of land)
612 tenant farmers, 4 freeholders (160 suns sale)
712 tenant farmers, 4 military colonists
810 tenant farmers, 2 freeholder (80 suns sale), 1 boyar (160 suns)
910 tenant farmers, 2 military colonists (160suns sale), 1 boyar (160 suns)
108 tenant farmers, 4 freeholder (160suns sale), 1 boyar (160 suns)
*Any emigrating family can be substituted for a family of tenant farmer if desired.

Tenant Farmers
Free farming family that works a leased grant of 40 acres in exchange for farming work, militia service, and taxes. Typical family will be five with three working bodies that are available to work the landowner's seeding and harvest. The household will provide one unarmored combatant with club, dagger, or other makeshift weapon.

Freeholders
Free farming family of five that works a purchased grant of 40 acres. In an emergency situation, the household will provide one combatant with leather armor and a long bow or spear/shield.

Military colonists
Family headed by former mercenaries, landsknechts or Kezmaroki bonders that works a leased grant of 40 acres in exchange for militia service. The household will provide one combatant with half plate, short sword and a pike or crossbow.

Boyars
Wealthy, but not titled landholder that purchases 120 acres. One family of five with 12 servants. In an emergency situation, the household will provide one mounted warrior with half plate, shield, sword and lance and three unarmored combatants with club, dagger, or other makeshift weapon.
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Campaign News and Presenting Behind the Scene Mechanics

August 6, 2013, 8:08 am
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Recently I shared a few of the subsystems I was using to run the colonizing domain game-like aspects of the Feral Shore new phase of the eponymous campaign here. Today I thought I'd share how I am planning on giving life and color to those tables by interweaving with my weekly (more or less) news reports that you can typically find here if you are on Google Plus.

And now the news...
It's high summer and riot season again in Kezmarok when the Sun Lord himself gets fever drunk on the white hotness of his luminescent magnitude. Jaded connoisseurs of local politics (i.e. most of the native population) sadly opine that the usual artfully planned and executed riots by Autrach-controlled Wellsprings of the Crowd have given way to sloppy and social-destabilizing ones this year.

Why take the massive free-for-all that occurred in the Little Hill Cantons quarter last week. Why Wellsprings agitators would pick the Gravy in Beard, a renowned drinking den of backhills Pahr bonders considered sacred by Radegast followers, as a nativist attack point seemed dangerously foolish. But the shavings (romanticized artist's rendition above) and over-the-top humiliations of the tavern goers that occurred seems insane beyond measure.

Worse yet it has provoked a bona fide political crisis. Though most of the bonder mercenaries manning the walls see those old pagans as annoyingly (and stridently) pagan they are still incensed by the violation of fellow Cantonals—in their own part of the city no less! A massive “ring” meeting of the companies has been called with wild rumors of an unprecedented “strike” hanging in the air.

In other news black is again the new black. Black-dyed velvet doublets with needle-lace armbands, dark-gilded merkins, and ebon peak caps are this summer's cutting edge of fashion in both the Cantons and Kezmarok.

Meanwhile back in the mud-encased Feral Shore colony of King's Ten (which incidentally is being called Kraldeset by Pahr-speakers from the Cantons) it's been a gorgon's bull ride of a week with the camp still reeling from the sudden—and horrible—suicide of beloved sleeper-sage Pelka who was found coughing blood from the glass bottle he had apparently consumed. A rambling incoherent note left behind mentioned odd statements like “must return that bowl” and “what's the planar frequency, Kenoth?”

Still morale remains relatively high with the boost of the recent royal visit, abject fear of the camp clown enforcer, and a new ditty composed by the men that is all the rage.
Current players map.
21.18 being King's Ten

Ballad of Kraldeset
Oh he's a rantin', rovin' blade,
He's a brisk and a feral lad,
Betide what may, my heart is glad,
To see my lad by Kral Stockade.

I'll sell my rock, I'll sell my reel,
My mistress and spinning wheel,
To buy my lad a doublet plaid,
A saber and pike at Kral Stockade.

And oh yes some new immigrants to the colony arrived on the cog today:
The Jaromirs, a laboring family of five from Ostrovo Canton looking to by 40 acres
The Dubceks, a laboring family of 4.5 from Marlinko Canton looking for the same above.

Malinka, 4 hp cruel-lipped executive assistant. Whip, leather and club. Will get you to the dungeon on time for 30 suns/month compensation otherwise settles down to run an abuse salon.

Brown Tomas, former indentured servant now 1st level fighter (6 hit points), arquebus (only works in Corelands), studded leather, morion helmet, scimitar. Stands in your personal space. 60 suns/month compensation to join personal retinue.

Kracki the Hooded One, 3 hp, Half-Plate (AC:5), pike, nunchucks. Laughs at all your jokes. 30 suns/month if part of retinue.



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From the Hill Cantons Cook Pit: Kezmaroki Vision-Bisque

August 9, 2013, 1:57 pm
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A popular dish in the great hostels of Kezmarok, this dish will add a warm, good-feeling glow to an otherwise dreary expedition to the local murder-hole. Pair with a sharp sheep cheese and a jug of Ptujian corn liquor or a pint of Radegast's Dark.

Mechanical Effects of a Single Serving (2d4 hours):
  • +2 to all saves vs. magic or death
  • Can attempt once to use Clairvoyance or Locate Object on a roll of 1 on a d6.
  • -3 on all attack rolls
  • Curl up in a ball babbling about childhood for 1d6 turns when the stew effects wear off.
    Shouldn't Have Gone Back for that Second Helping.
Ingredients
  • 12 ounces)of Hu'uz (mildly-hallucinogenic mollusk), shell-on (Can substitute Earth shrimp
    sauteed in hash or canola oil depending on what you have in your root-cellar)
  • 1 onion, chopped, divided
  • 1 carrot, peeled and sliced
  • 1 stalk(s) celery (with leaves), sliced
  • 1/2 cup(s) dry white wine
  • 1/2 teaspoon(s) black peppercorns
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 4 ounce(s) Psilocybin, wiped clean (emphasis on this step) and sliced (about 1.5 cups)
  • 1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
  • 1/4 cup(s) chopped scallions
  • 2 tablespoon(s) chopped fresh parsley
  • 1/4 cup(s) all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 cup(s) pelgrane milk
  • 1/4 cup(s) reduced-fat sour cream
  • 1/4 cup(s) Slivovce (or dry sherry)
  • Freshly ground pepper to taste
Directions:

  1. Combine the hu'uz with about half the onion, all the carrot, celery, wine, peppercorns and bay leaf in a large heavy saucepan. Add water and simmer over low heat for about 30 minutes. Strain through a sieve, pressing on the solids to extract all the juices; discard the solids. Measure the shrimp stock and add water, if necessary, to make 1 1/2 cups.
  2. Heat oil in the same pan over medium heat. Add magic mushrooms, bell pepper, scallions, parsley and the remaining onion. Cook, stirring, until the mushrooms are soft, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle with flour and cook, stirring constantly, until it starts to turn golden, 2 to 3 minutes. Slowly stir in milk and the shrimp stock. Cook, stirring to loosen any flour sticking to the bottom of the pot, until the soup returns to a simmer and thickens, about 5 minutes. Add the reserved shrimp and cook until they turn opaque in the center, about 2 minutes more. Add sour cream, slivovce and lemon juice; stir over low heat until heated through-do not let it come to a boil. 
  3. Enjoy the ride, man.   
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Hill Cantons Myths Part Two

August 12, 2013, 9:33 am
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This is what happens when you read too much Glorantha and Robert Graves.  
Off to Storm the Summer Country, the Golden Company A-went.
How Dalibor and Luboš Became Twin-Rays
One and fifteen score years ago it came to pass in the vale of Velky Rajetz that two identical twins, Dalibor and Luboš, were born to Eliška Vu-Krašny, the ostensibly virginal daughter of the Voivod of that place. Though to her father she spun a magnificent tale of being embraced by the armor-gleamed Sun Lord himself in the sun-dappled meadows beyond the blood-apricot orchards, the straight-necked Voivod was inclined to believe that her lover was no other than his own wayward, sorcery-addled half-brother, František.

Fearing his wrath Eliška fled down the road to the market-village of Marlinko (now the city of Marlank). The Voivod's bond-knights gave pursuit and near the time-weathered shrine of the Horned Oracle, Luboš fell from her arms. Wretched with grief and guilt—and knowing that her own death was near--the fair Eliška swaddled her remaining son and left him in the offering box of the nearby monastery of the Brothers of the Other Mother. It was none too soon as her pursuers were quickly on her trampling the poor maiden under their cruel hooves.

Now it came to pass that Luboš instead of dying on that cold hill-slope was found by the shade Xatis, a castrato-being worshiped in times long past by a forgettable pagan people who lacked all panache and verve. While shorn of both his manhood and sense of divine purpose, Xatis was not a bad sort and raised the bawling lad as his own son in a vast cave called Raustuun in the wilds of the south.

Fierce-eyed Dalibor spent his early childhood in the company of kindly monks who made use of his nimble hands in the monastery cobbler shop. On reaching his seventh birthday the loving, doting monks sold the child to Lord-General Hartung Hellabrecht for a sack of turnips. While in the service of that stern, erudite general, whose campaigns in the Corelands are almost-remembered to this day, Dalibor became inured to both the soldierly life and the the life of the mind.

Though they both led separate lives Dalibor and Luboš they grew up feeling a great yawning hole in their psyches.

On his 18th birthday Luboš proclaimed to his guardian, “today I am a man and I yearn to travel the world and deal with my abandonment issues by a perhaps diverting and self-medicating life of heroic action and drunken wanton.” Xatis in his shrill, yet not unkindly voice gave him leave along with three gifts of magic most potent.

Setting forth from Raustuun on the road to Nowhere [a reference cryptic to modern historians] Luboš espied a great company of landsknechts and war-wagons coming up the road. Raised feral and proud the boy refused to give ground. A young sallet-helmed officer in the van of the host gave challenge to a wrestling match [a common contest of jurisprudence in that time]. During that scuffle in which neither could get the advantage of the other, the helmet rolled off the officer revealing no other than his lost twin brother, Dalibor.

“By the Sun Lord's sweaty balls,” exclaimed Dalibor. “Sweet screaming Mistress of the Mountains,” countered Luboš. The two brothers, once convinced that the other was not just conjured by the sheer will of their respective vanities—which were indeed immense by all accounts—became fast and inseperable companions.

The deeds of the civilized, yet violent Dalibor and the wild, but delicate Luboš following their reunion are too numberable and on occasion too-contradictory (such as the varying accounts of either a bittersweet rapprochement with their father or a terrible siege/slaying before belatedly recognizing their dear old dad) to mention with much detailed justice in this account. But we all know the Major Deeds: the bearding of the Circle Mistress of Habeka, the great heist (and abandonment) of the four cursed brother-blades, the routing of the Horsehead Host, and most of all that final last great expedition where they raised the Golden Company and stormed the Summer Country itself for the glory of our most beloved Sun before disappearing to the heavens.
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GuadaComaCon Coming at You Free This Saturday

August 13, 2013, 12:41 pm
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Our third annual minicon down here in South Texas, GuadaComaCon, is running this Saturday 10 am -10 pm, August 17 at the New Braunfels Convention Center. Admission is still totally free (though we welcome contributions), so come one, come all.

SCHEDULED GAMES (times subject to change)
  • Prime Directive (GURPS Star Trek; 6 players): 10 a.m.-2 p.m.
  • Axles & Alloys (vehicle combat based on Full Thrust rules; 6 players; minis provided): 10 a.m.-2 p.m. 
  • Jeff Dee, Tekumel, 10 am – 2 p.m.
  • Warhammer 40,000 mega battle (unlimited players; bring a 1500-point list army and a 2000-point list army; painted models suggested): 10 a.m. meet; play from 11 a.m.-5 p.m.
  • 5150: Star Navy (Two Hour Wargames spaceship combat; 6 players; all miniatures supplied or bring your own): 2 p.m.-6 p.m.
  •  HOTT-Hammer tournament (Hordes of the Things fantasy rules; unlimited players; loaner armies available):  3 p.m.-7 p.m.
  •  Battle of Hoth (using FUBAR rules; 4 players): 6 p.m.-10 p.m.
  •  Song of Blades and Heroes (generic fantasy skirmish; 6 players): 6 p.m.-10 a.m.
  • Cavemaster RPG with Talzhemir Mrr 
  • Swords & Wizardry with Dennis Sustarre
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OD&D Kids Hack Freebie Download Up

August 16, 2013, 10:48 am
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Longtime readers may remember that I taught a creative writing and fantasy worldbuilding class for kids at a local school last Spring—that, of course, devolved into a lot of homebrewed roleplaying mayhem.


As I put the last touches on Building Imaginary Worlds II for the Fall semester, I figured it'd be neighborly of me to share the complete (well...complete as this four page thing can be) pdf of those rules with the rest of you knuckleheads. Find that download right here under the title of "Swords and Portals" (title thanks to Josie, the student who won the naming contest).  
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The Hill Cantons Big Dumb Reincarnation Chart

August 22, 2013, 11:31 am
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Tuesday night saw a tragic turn in the FLAILSNAILS world when  Ba Chim, that hitherto long-surviving scamp of a New Hampshirean landknecht-dandy, was claimed by the bloodthirsty and capricious dice-gods who cruelly took his 12 hit point life by anti-climatically slipping from a rope on a routine climb just moments after the party slew the resident godling, Grandfather Tiger, in his gabled Feral Shore temple. 

But as Sarah Silverman once famously said “when life gives you AIDS, make lemonaids” (so terrible, sorry) and after a long debate by the (cheapskate) party around the various life-raising options, it was decided to pull the elf from the sun-deprived arms of the maidens under the Holy Oak in the Valley of Am'est and have the Willie Nelson-esque High Druid of Svat the Four-Faced reincarnate his foppish ass.

I am not ashamed to admit that I fully approved of subjecting a player to the mercy of that chart having had a history of frequent abuse of that chart back in the ye old hoary day of soulless AD&D elves. Watching those elf-heavy parties slowly morph into a motley crew of talking badgers, boars and gnolls was too priceless. With the surviving players going on about using the non-standard, goofy-ass critters I love to throw at them on a custom chart I knew I had to do it (also a good excuse to catalog all my custom monsters in a single post).
awww Hell...

Roll a d24
  4. Norker
  5. Grotmen
  8. Polymuf
  14. Qol
  15. Moonman
  16. Micronaut
  18. Grugach
  22. Ghost Minotaur
  23. Serpentwoman
  24. Kirbyesque Space God (in protean form)
Punchline: meet Ba Chim the Wereshark.  
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The Hill Cantons Bestiary: Polymufs

August 23, 2013, 7:46 am
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Yesterday's goofball post on the custom Reincarnation table (that I will henceforth be using in the eponymous campaign) reminded me that I have been slacking in my write-ups of the horde of custom monsters I have been using. My typical excuse is that I don't tip my hand to the players, but the qualities of many of these critters are well-known to them at this point—so here we go.

The following "poor dear" creatures are an homage to the work of late John Christopher, in particular the supremely dark, post-apocalyptic Sword of the Spirits series which I ate up with delicious pre-teen anguish. They played a starring role as relatively sympathetic NPCs in the mini-campaign “dragon hunt” sideshow that took place on two small islands far to the south of the Cantons. 


Polymufs
No. Enc: 2d6/1-100
Alignment: Chaotic (Good, Evil, Whatever)
Movement: 120’
Armor Class: variable by armor
Hit Dice: ½ (house polymuf)/1 (field polymuf)/ 2 (feral polymuf)
Attacks: 1
Damage: weapon
Save: F0/F1/F2
Morale: 6/7/10
A firm, but unfair social order greets newborns on the Southlands island of Ptuj. Plagued by two centuries of increasingly bizarre mutations among the population, the local Rada (council) long-ago issued a decree-- irrespective of family social station--that all residents would be divided into three castes on birth: (at least visibly) deformity-free “citizens” (who wear their feathered hair and pastel tunics tied over the shoulder as a sign of their superiority), the “dwarfs” (midgets who are second-class craftsmen but ostensibly free), and the enslaved “polymufs” (the visibly-deformed, semi-free underclass of the island).

While many polymufs remain cowed by the centuries of servitude, others who style themselves “polymuf and proud” have weathered the treacherous local currents and slipped off into the Weird to found “freegan” maroon colonies built around a life of hand-me-down ancient literature and communal living. Life is tough for the feral maroons, yet there is a certain panache and skill in arms that accompanies those that truly “live freegan or die.”

Deformation Table (Roll d20 for each polymuf)
1-2...Almost passable (deformation under the clothes line)
3-10...Minor visible deformation
11-17...Major visible deformation
18-19...1-4 deformations at least one visible
20...Major deformation and mutation (1-4 physical, 5-6 mental on Gamma World 1st edition mutations table)  
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Elder Scrolls, In-Game Books and Player Info-Dump Opt-In (or Out)

August 28, 2013, 8:09 am
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I came late to the Morrowind and Skyrim party (though Daggerfall, which bored me to tears, was some where back in my past). Truth be told both games ate up inordinate amounts of my blog writing time and energy as is my addictive wont.

One positive take-home I received from playing both games, Morrowind in particular, is how unobtrusively the game designers worked in layers and layers of setting depth by scattering hundreds of in-game books to be read at the player's leisure—or not. Here is a book that details the site-specific account (and gameably useful) of a long-past archaeological expedition, there one dealing with the intricate cosmology of the demon-like Daedra, and another purely some fictional in-setting story.

See I love this. 

I am a notoriously impatient player of crpgs with their invariable info-dumps—far more even then my customary tabletop “five minutes and I am out” intolerance—abruptly clicking over and over again through cut scenes and NPCs monologues. But that kind of impatience is at odds with my love of worldbuilding and leisurely exploration of the layers of a setting's mysteries—and of course successfully playing the game.

Others have explored the games' successes with creating an expanded world beyond the bounding of each game's sandbox. I am way more interested in how the technique might be useful to my own sandbox campaign where the players seem to want to explore this stuff at varying levels and with their own hand on the throttle.

So far it has seemed to work very well on both ends. The players approach me individually during downtime, hiring a sage or doing direct research in a temple library, and ask specific sets of questions about ranges of background they want to explore to achieve party and individual goals. I get a chance to put my cracked, 3 am thoughts about the Hill Cantons to paper. Win, win.

But why describe when I can show. Here are a couple recent examples.
Five Shades of Azure
[Bundled up this week with the usual curt dispatch papers from the Decade King's courier is a gift: a rat-gnawed, leather-bound manuscript penned 518 years ago by a  Kežmaroki march-officer, Balazas. A short note from Prince Vdelko tersely reads “of obvious interest.”]

Contrary to the prejudices of the Rock [High Kežmarok] our Pahr subjects here on the Shore are not quite the uncouth louts they are made out to be in polite society. To the contrary, I have had many a pleasing—if such a word can be used when suffering the pains of court exile—moment here at Vygrot in their hearty bearded company laughing at their colorful tall tales, seeing the blush of the red-cheeked village maidens in their white linen and floral bodices...[long, racy and embarrassingly clumsy digression].

Month Five, the Longest Patrol
I can understand the nervousness of the men as I pass in quick inspection, the local reputation of the Ruševin is one of utter fear—when it's not being studiously avoided with a stubbornly-cultivated ignorance. To be sure the hollow bones of the dull malachite walls and jutting, skewed spires sprawl oppressively along the crest of Bojan's Peak and the saddlebacked ridge behind.

But my station now affords no question and orders remain orders to those in service. Mounted, me on my charger, the wardens on their shaggy steppe ponies, the patrol takes the switch-backed, broken ruin of a road up from the valley floor. Passing through the curtain of tall, black pines, an eerie stillness and  a strange buzzing sensation descends over us, hushing the coarse jokes and gossip. The outriders find their way hemmed in by the treeline and gladly regain the quiet comfort of the main column.

Closing in on the western slope we can now make out features of the ruins. Rubble fields and a few free-standing walls seem to rule on this side, giving way to a wide boulevard which stretches north-south from the hulking mass of the gatehouse and the gleaming mass of the outer walls. That central avenue threads its way up to a large enclosed structure—its proportions even from this far distance huge in dimensions.

What giants or demons must have raised such an edifice and for what purpose? Not a single window pierces its massive, long-running walls and the only egress seems to be enormous stone portals that look several stories tall.

With a shudder we are glad to leave this site [sic] behind as the trail turns north to the snow-clad peaks. Even combat with the fire-dwarves that haunt those heights seems welcome to spending time contemplating the horrors that must lurk in such a place...

Lost Vlko and Romuilak the Lupine
[The monograph as commissioned by He Whose Howls Echo Among the Ages, His Fecundity, Tazrun, the Illuminious and Mighty Seneschal of All the Southlands.]
For a people who had their origin in the horse-stunk nomad hordes of the Sea of Grass the Pahr people have been remarkably at home in the scrubby hills, rounded peaks, high valleys and crags of Zem. While many of the hill clans have long since been domesticated into the (slightly) more sedate lives of Overkingdom cantons, tales of the “lost kingdoms”, Old Pahr petty mountain kingdoms that dropped from the historical record centuries ago--and into the popular imagination of this day.

One such tale that looms large in the so-called Southern Cycle, that great collection of folk ballads and tall tales of how the Pahr came to migrate, conquer and be conquered in the post-Hyperborean era, is that of Vlko and its hirsute, half-wild founder, Romuilak the Lupine. Many a man of science would like to believe that Vlko still exists, nestled high in the Cerny mountains, with a people prospering by the simple, bellicose virtues of the Old Pahr hidden and secure from modernity.

“Wild Child” and Twin stories are common amongst all the peoples of the Overkingdom and often mix the heroic and divine. Romuilak's story begins along archetypical lines, an unknown, yet presumed lordly father and harassed mother abandon two twins. Where upon Romuliak is raised by a pack of bog-wolves (known to be great nurturers) and his brother (whose name is lost in time) by an occular bat.

Growing to adulthood, the two are reunited, go on great adventures and gain possession of three mighty items of great magic: the Bear-Cloak of Molak, the Shaggus Staff of Oldest Lhoma and the Cyclo-Crown of Hming the Arched. With these mighty items and a swelling army of druzhina, amazons, reverse centaurs and war-ocelots they sack and raise Xol, the last great Hyperborean successor city-state.

Anger issues satiated, the twin warlords then began to construct a great city, Vlko, on the summits of the two massive, rubble piles of Xol's wreckage. Shortly thereafter a routine sibling spat over who was allowed to sit on the right side of the mead-hall table spilled over into tragic violence and Romuilak slew his twin with a single, greasy blow of a pork chop.

The aggrieved and heart-broken Romuilak swore to make war no more, closed the borders and devoted his remaining years to making Vlko a shining petty-kingdom on the hill...
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The Hill Cantrevs of Weirdain Mini-Campaign

August 30, 2013, 2:00 pm
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One of my oldest and dearest fantasy influences is Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain. The Prydain books were the first fantasy novels that I bought and read entirely on my own. Evanline Ness's expressionistic covers and strong, evocative black-and-white maps grabbed me and
Alexander's writing sealed the deal. I blew through all five books as quickly as the Troll Book Club could deliver them.

Though a few Prydain-influenced NPCs, subtly and not-so subtly-veiled, have crept into the home campaign (all hail Lord Gurgi, Master of Tables and the Hambone), I have been jonesing for an avenue to play around in the setting.

The recently released old school-ish Beyond the Wall--which explicitly nods its head to Alexander and another favorite Ursula LeGuin—ramped that desire up again. That BTW features at its core a fellow-traveller lifepath character generation to that of the Hill Cantons Compendium (and to some extent Feudal Anarchy) that evoke the archetypes and tropes of the best Young Adult fantasy of my distant youth is just gravy.

So here we go with another half-baked mini-campaign, 2/3rds Prydain and 1/3 of my own insanity. The players will be the callow youth of Commot Flaylsnaith a small village just over the Little Avern from the Free Commots in the scrubby, war-torn Hill Cantrevs (naturally). Rules expanded below will basically be By This Wall chargen and magic mashed into my old friend, first edition Stormbringer.

Character Generation and House Rules
1. Pick a phlegmy-sounding Welsh here or Lloyd Alexander here name

2. Roll 1d6+5 for each of your starting stats (note that POW will sub out for WIS). Roll 3d6 for SIZ. Don't sweat the low-seeming stats, you are going to get a buttload of bumps using the playbooks. Note that you don't roll for your starting class as per normal Stormbringer.

3. Pick one of the following Beyond the Wall playbooks:
Village Hero
Untested Thief
Witch's Prentice
Would Be Knight (in this case Cantrev lord's warrior)
Young Woodsman
Forgotten Child (available from the free Nobility supplement here.)
Nobleman's Wild Daughter (as above)

4. Add any modifiers to your stats as directed (maximum of 18). Yes, you will likely end up with much higher attributes than usual BTW (that's a consolation prize for sucking more than the normal SB character.) Hit points are SIZ + CON divided by 2.

5. When the Playbook directs you to add a skill, add +20% to an appropriate-looking SB skill. A Weapon Specialization or any other Combat skill for example would add 20% to a Weapon Skill, a craft/profession skill 20% to a similar Craft or Lore skill, etc. Ask me if you aren't sure what the equivalent would be. Give yourself two bonus +10% hikes on skills.

6. Take the starting equipment as outlined in each playbook. We will be using prices from BTW. Leather Armor is the same, while Chainmail is the same as Half-Plate in SB.

7. Magic will also as directed by BTW with my rough conversion of effects. Ignore Fortune Points (fortune favors the bold), Alignment and Initiative (it's by DEX as per SB).

8. Purely optional step. BTW provides a really nifty co-creation take on building your starting village. The quick and dirty, when you roll on a table with a woodcut-looking scroll icon on the right side, that's your cue to make up a locale in the village entirely. When you see the open hand icon that's your cue to make up a relevant village NPC to your backstory.

So away we go aspiring pig-herds and petulant brats. Rumors and hooks coming next.


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Pompeii as Model Undercity or Ruins

September 3, 2013, 9:22 am
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Over the long weekend besides running a surprisingly-fun character-generation only session of the new Hill Cantrevs/Beyond the Wall mini-campaign (more about that later) and basking in the never-ending white-hot Texas sun, I had some mental room to get back to working on my cyclopean city-ruinspointcrawlproject.

In the course of doing some research on real world existing ruins I discovered some wonderful, “I would be challenged to do it better” finds.

I am a firm believer in non-linear site design (thanks to that thought-provoking  old analysis by Melan) and how that makes for richer, more-interesting gameplay for the site-based focus of D&D, it's stunning just how much real sites seem to provide rich examples. And even more wonderful that thanks to the vast Annwn storehouse of stolen knowledge how easy it is to rustle up some inspiring visual examples.

Take Pompeii.

Truth be told I have modified actual-existing small-scale maps of that city for my Jakallan undercity (and later Kezmarok undercity when I shamelessly reskinned it), but at the time had never seen a larger-scale block map. Now thanks to Guide Archeologiche Mondadori: Pompei  by Eugenio La Rocca, Mariette and Arnold de Vos check this out.
Click to enlarge.

Notice how you have large access street-corridors with several avenues of approach. These can take the place of central staircases or main corridors of mega-dungeons that provide quick access to the “deeper” sections while presenting players with a number of exploratory choices. With the numbering system already here you can project a pointcrawl system quite easily to help guide travel and exploration in the zoomed out mode.


Even better is how the Roman-penchant for creating dense urban complexes (insulae) breaks the blocks down into a number of smaller discreet areas themselves sub-divided with large numbers of interlocked, non-linear choices. The above-mentioned book and some other internet sources even provide a wonderful selection of “pre-keyed” micro-examples of the city's larger villas, each of them could make for nice little sub-dungeons. (Note that these maps are mostly sites from that larger block map.)






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Don Featherstone R.I.P.

September 4, 2013, 7:16 am
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Just heard from a friend that DonaldFeatherstone passed away yesterday at 95 from complications following a fall at his flat in Southampton, UK. Featherstone was for mini wargamers one of the pioneering hobby giants and great popularizers along with (his close friend) Tony Bath, Charles Grant and (the other) Phil Barker.
Featherstone as a young tanker in WW2.
An oral account of his combat experience can be found here. 
Though he had a tendency to sometimes lapse into Colonel Blimpness in his historical writings on the small wars of the Victorian Age, he left behind a long legacy of incredibly useful and experimental books on wargaming.

Featherstone was particularly fond of the blackpowder period armies, however his books and other writing exhibited a wide ranging understanding and a creativity many times bordering on the wide-open imaginative play often associated with roleplaying games. His book Solo Wargaming, for instance, has a fascinating chapter on 19th-century solo campaigns on the Northwest Frontier of South Asia including some interesting examples of fake newspaper/campaign journals (see my scan below) spinning stories out of the emergent play at the wargame table.
Click to enlarge. 

Fortunately thanks to John Curry's History of Wargames project you can buy new, affordable reprints of much of his work (why doesn't the rpg hobby have an equivalent). Find a list of those books here.

Don Featherstone, presente.
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D&D Omni-Style

September 11, 2013, 11:51 am
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A couple years back I remember seeing on some forum or the other an entirely weird (and there for wonderful) collage-like ad for our favorite fantasy game from OMNI magazine. 

With a vaguely New Wave aesthetic backed by the liquid surrealism that seemed to be the bread and butter of the art of that magazine (a look and tone that seeped way down into the space opera reaches of my soul) the ad really stood out from the cartoony ones that TSR pumped out at the time in its quest for a young market share.

Until lunch hour--in which I happened to be (virtually) flipping through two more issues from the late part of 1981—I was unaware that that ad had some companions. All three posted here for your non-ironic/ironically-detached viewing pleasure.



(By the way, you can find the entire run of OMNI here legally and free.)
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