Pre WWII Pulp Setting Campaign with an Indo European flavor Using Wretched Darkness & Fantastic Heroes And Witchery Part III

 Make no mistake even though I haven't talked about it, Wretched Interbellum is definite about themes of cosmic horror. Because it couples so well with the broken promises of World War I to both those who served and to the world. The supernatural tidal wave of World War II promised to engulf the world in a cascade of destruction and Hellfire. This blog post picks right up from here on the blog. 

There were forty million killed during World War I and the world easily forgets these numbers. The supernatural world not so easily as the dead & undead crawl into the spiritual world. Fantastic Heroes and Witchery uses a variation of the Great Wheel which means that in some ways the Great Wheel model of the planes fits a sorta of Christian & Pagan model of the planes. Which allows one to fit the Beyond into this as a realm connected with Purgatory. 

World War II leads to the uprising of the supernatural as well as the undead from World War I begin filling in the ranks of the damned for the upcoming world war. This all stems into the realm of Dreams and the Fey. This means that the Fey are already lowering thier tendrils into Europe's underworld. And this sets up some of the deadly factions that we find in Wretched Darkness. And we get a good sense of exactly what's coming from Wretchedverse issue #21 A Guide to The Wretchedverse. 

Pre WWII Pulp Setting Campaign with an Indo European flavor Using Wretched Darkness & Fantastic Heroes And Witchery

 So going back too Fanastic Heroes and Witchery PC's has been interesting to say the least. Over the last day or so I've been reading old campaign notes. And this post is going to right up from here on the blog. And looking into having a horror based F&W horror game has been interesting because the players want to kick supernatural behind. 

Now the Pulp classes from FH&W are as follows: 
Necronimus ( Spiritualist) class, occultist, Psychic, Rifleman, savant(scientist), the skylord, and the wild brute. We've got these classes set against the supernatural of the Beyond ( which is actually Purgetory between Heaven & Hell) in our campaigns. 

Wretched Darkness first & seond edition presents an interesting delemia mixed with FH&W because what do you do with the D&D style wizards?! The answer is simple we use the existing magic guilds and wizard schools set in stable Fairyland areas. Technically speaking you could take the whole cloth of the campaign setting of Wretched Darkness 2nd edition and run it with Fantastic Heroes and Witchery. The supernatural world is still reeling from the unquiet dead of World War I. Add to this instability of the world and it's a perfect opportunity for the horror factions of Wretched Darkness to make in roads into the world. 
And we can see factions looking at South America, Mexico, France, Russia, and other nearer European theaters being too juicy targets for the supernatural or cults for that matter to leave alone. 

And we've been using a Tainted version of Greyhawk to this mix where the various Greyhawk monster factions looking over Europe and licking thier metaphorial chops.  I could see the characters journeying to Greyhawk to sabatoge a humaniod army filled with pig faced Orcs and the like under the purview of Luz. 

Paris France has been one of our occult mainstay cities for decades along with Portugal because of thier roles in the conquest of the 'New World'. The tide of violence and blood has been the source of supernatural energies of decades. These centers of forgotten power draw occult societies and cults like moths to flames. 
These places are also going to be beckons for many knightly orders who still exist in secret. 

With fading colonial interests and deadly enemies waiting in the shadows. Who knows what is moving around the swirl of desparate partiers and jet setters of the displaced royals, world weary vets, and others who move among the Interbellum crowds and elite. 

 Here's where I'm thinking of slipping in Raiders of the Lost artifacts for it's relic rules. These magical artifacts allow gods and other divine entities to have a toe hold in the world and allow them to possibly comeback into the modern era after thier time or era cycle is gone. 
This is something I've been toying with after reading up on the legends of the Devil's witch shools in Iceland. The idea that the supernatural continually recycles its agents and what not has a very nice appeal to me as a DM. More to come! 

Pre WWII Pulp Setting Campaign with an Indo European flavor Using Wretched Darkness & Fantastic Heroes And Witchery Part II

 The last couple of days have been very hectic to say the least with my day job and between real life events the alternative Pulp universe of Fantastic Heroes & Witchery mixed with a campaign of Wretched Interbellum has been on my mind. The nihlism of the European mindset after the events of World War I and the broken promises to US servicemen laid the ground work for the coming supernatural darkness of World War II. And this blog entry picks right  up from here on the blog. 

 

And it once again got me thinking about the artwork that was looted from various European and African countries  during World War I. How many occult and supernatural artifacts & relics disappeared into private collections. And how many are still within the collections of elite occultists during the Wretched Interbellum period. 
The Antiquities market during the Interbellum years saw thousands of artifacts sacked from Africa be moved into private collector and museum hands. The money involved in the black market of these items is both lucritive and incredibly scary. Murder and double cross are common. 

Add into this the growing supernatural cults and secret societies of the interbellum years then mix in the interest in the occult. And you've got a witch's brew of greed and fervor that is the perfect breeding ground for Wretched Darkness second edition entities to gain a toe hold on Earth. 

Pre WWII Pulp Setting Campaign with an Indo European flavor Using Wretched Darkness & Fantastic Heroes And Witchery

 So today myself & my wife were laying in Thanksgiving day supplies & just made it before the snows flew tonight. And all day Fantastic Hereos & Witchery plus The Red Room's Wretched Darkness 1st edtion rpg and 2nd edition campaign setting has been on my mind. Because of the fact that I got off the phone with a buddy of mine. He saw my recent Swords & Witchery Valley of Stone and Fire blog post here. 
Imagine that the Apocalyse is next door & that out on the streets tonight horror is a doorway away from the modern nights of 2023. The shadows are stalked by Weird Tales style Fanastic Heroes and Witchery PC's. 

Fantastic Heroes & Witchery's PC class levels top out at thirteen and The Wretchedverse's titles top out on the high side of ten. So the differences are not that far off for monsters,treasures, etc. Technically speaking you could take the whole cloth of the campaign setting of Wretched Darkness 2nd edition and run it with Fantastic Heroes and Witchery. 

This isn't a joke you could take the whole cloth of Wretched Darkness from factions to full blown monsters and just go to town. And then take the Tainted version of Greyhawk and combined it with this whole cloth OSR design to run anything from Weird Tales Pulp to full on Science Fantasy. 

So theoritically you could have your fantasy PC's crossing over into your modern horror rpg style games. This is just a thought but it makes sense give the number of fantasy character options. I love the idea of the Weird Tales and Pulp classes for Fantastic Heroes & Witchery opposing the horror and darkness of Wretched Darkness second edition. The biggest thing I see with such a campaign and working out the details is watching the damage threshold. Given the Pulp PC and Science Fantasy option plus the other optional  Fantasy PC classes. 
Wretched Darkness and the Wretched Interbellum campaign settings could be used together to created a whole cloth pre WWII Pulp setting with an indo European flavor. 

I'm still working out details such as country, place, players, which factions, and more. Details to come! 

The Valley of Stone & Fire - Thundarr and Fantastic Heroes and Witchery - Campaign Set up #2

 The valley of Stone & Fire was a post apocalpytic game that I had ran ages ago using Fantastic Heroes & Witchery as a one shot back in 2015. You can find that here on the blog. And lately I've been having a hankering for doing a post apocalpytic Western style game. 
This morning I met with my players at our usual diner for breakfast. I needed to do this fast for the weekend. 
And the over all feeling among the players was positive. They wanted a Thundarr The Barbarian style post apocalyptic game. Since we already had a campaign ready to go that wasn't a problem. We were using Tim Snider's Thundarr The Barbarian sourcebook (see below). 

The reason for using Fantastic Heroes and Witchery is the fact that the base damage is at a lower weapon and dice threshold. This is closer to B/X and original Dungeons & Dragons. 

That damage threshold is exceeded in Mutant Future (not that Mutant Future is a bad game). The fact is that the B/X and OD&D damage system are easier for some players to deal with. 

Tim Snider's excellent free Thundarr Sourcebook for Mutant Future

Available right over
HERE 
Free 

The Petrified Forrest contains the remains of a former US Military base that's still being run by androids. The whole affair is where the former PC's disappeared. And here's the hook that gets the ball rolling. The former base is known far & wide for churning out monsterous cyborg horrors. What no one knows is that the base is a former Cryo prison. The androids have been converting the prisoners into bio weapons.. The cryogenic facility's inmates in the section that the PC's were in was drawn from Fishwife Game's 100 Male Inmates available right HERE

'A Visit To The Chapel Of Lost Regrets' - Fantastic Heroes & Witchery Rpg Session Report

 So I casually mentioned that I was thinking about running our Eighties Science Fantasy Fantastic Heroes and Witchery rpg game campaign. And immediately I had players pulling out old characters & we're  suddenly having the PC's dealing with going on the 'Old Doleman Trail' just out outside 'Blighted Forrest'. They had an old mining wagon and having escaped 'Tegel Manor' were on thier way into the 'The Deep Forrest'. So I had thrown this together spur of the moment with a heavy use of  White Box Gothic. 

The player's PC's ran across a small deserted chapel inbetween the 'Old Doleman Trail' & the Deep Forrest. 
The chapel is dedicated to Orcus and became the focus point for this afternoon's adventure. The PC's knew that something was completely and utterly 'off' about the chapel. 

They decided to venture inside and it seemedly the place had been sort of small shrine or chapel of light orginally. There were demonic symbols in graffiti all over the place. 

And the aure of corruption was everyplace and there were indications that the chapel/shrine was being used as the sight of worship for a local cult of Chaos! 
The players were not amused to say the least. And that's when they heard the voice, 'Will you be staying for services?!' They came face to face with some sorta of undead! He commanded about a dozen skeletons and the party was up to it's hip bones in skeleton with weapons. 
And the knights almost made it too the boss when they got hit with a crippling wounds. What the Hell?! 
This is when the players suddenly discovered that they were up against a clerical lich of Orcus! Oh this didn't sit well because of the fact that they suddenly remembered where they were! The Chapel of Lost Regrets a place inbetween worlds that sits at the edge of the Wood Between Worlds. The party quickly dispatched four of the skeletons and then made it back to the wagon! Then they think they've left behind the chapel. The skeletons they fought today were actually thier old PC's remains from the last time we ran Fantastic Heroes And Witchery! 

Most of the information about this version of Orcu came outta of Castles & Crusades Tomb of the Unclean! What is the Chapel of Lost Regrets?! The Chapel is a corrupted Chaos temple that travels between the realms of dream & reality. The in campaign reason that this place exists is that a champion of Chaos cursed the chapel to wander across the planes appearing here & there to trap and damn adventurers into the claws of Orcus. '

Fantastic Heroes & Witchery Rpg Blues - Visions of Campaigns Past

Last night I found myself around a table discussing OSR or old school gaming subjects & Fantastic Heroes & Witchery came up.  Why?! Because this is a OSR game that haunts me as a DM. Once upon a time I had a full blown Eighties Science Fantasy campaign going using Fantastic Heroes & Witchery. Partially this campaign was based on the Eighties cultclassic TV show  Otherworld as well other Eighties Science Fiction shows. We used many of the  Science-Fantasy Classes and Race – PDF  from the Fantastic Heroes & Witchery website. And for a long time it was a solid campaign. And then one of our players went off the rails and passed away. The whole game fell apart ages ago.

Fantastic Heroes & Witchery apparently was/is partially based on Troll Lords Castles & Crusades system with a bit of the author's own spin on the game system. Last night really got me thinking about getting a campaign off the ground again. 

One of which is the fact that Troll Lords has a solid monsters and treasure book in the form of 

Castles & Crusades Monsters & Treasure. And this helps to fill in the gap for monsters & treasure within Fantastic Heroes & Witchery. 
And why a campaign now?! While this is a thought excercise at the moment there are couple of reasons for this. One is the fact that I've got a ton of experience under my belt. Two is the fact that I loath unresolved campaigns on my mind. And three is the current state of the world. I'd love to do a far more with the system then it has gotten time at my table top. This isn't my first time lamenting the fact that Fantastic Heroes & Witchery hasn't gotten the love it deserves. A review from 2017 by Maros on Amazon describes FH&W thus;" Currently my favorite “OSR”-style game. Here’s a very terse rundown: Unified Score mods & XP advancement chart. Standard races plus “Weird Tales” extras: Cthulhu & Pulp (Primates, Tainted Humans, etc). Alignment is per basic D&D (Chaotic, Neutral, & Law – interesting, vast majority are neutral unless they have specific reasons). Lots & lots of classes (including 3rd-era prestige fleshed out full classes): “Traditional” (Fighter, Wizard, etc), Racial (Elven Arcane Archer, Gnome Illusionist, etc), & “Weird Tales” (Cthulhu, Pulp, Psionic, & 30s style SciFi). Saving throws are decreasing (per standard A/D&D)), but to-hit is ascending (per 3rd-era). The former was obviously a concession to allow for easy use with AD&D material. I’d personally go ascending (level + mod vs attack – per C&C) and use the C&C monster/treasure books. (Or make allowance for A/D&D sources.) Lots of extras in here, including rules, more optional classes, and even optional 3rd-era skills." And if your going to grab Fantastic Heroes & Witchery for the love of God grab the Lulu printing which is only 31.29 plus shipping. Noble Knight is selling the book for $50.oo. 

What really prompted this dive back into FH&W is reading through Castles & Crusades Monsters & Treasure.  And the amount of Fey,fairies, & other creatures really stirs the imagination. There's something about the interplay of unrealized campaign material & monsters that does something to the imagination. Or it could just be unresolved regrets of campaigns past.. 

Where The Treasures Are - Rpg Pundit's Sword & Caravan From Mad Scribe Games For The Lion & Dragon rpg & Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg

This is post is going to pick right up from here on the blog.   Part of the advantage to diving into Sword & Caravan is the fact that there's so much setting information much of it a bit on the daunting side of things. That being said the book is also perfect for Lamentations of the Flame Princess with some gaming adjustments such as level & PC stat adjustments . These are no big deal. The big deal with Sword & Caravan seems to be deciding where to place your party of PC's on the Silk Road! 

Sword & Caravan dives deeply into a world of the past that no longer exists at all. The advantage here is that while history has been written by the victors. The past is a fertile ground to place your party of adventurers. And while yesterday I spoke of using demi humans with Sword & Caravan don't over do it as my adopted uncle used to say. Basically we've gone with the Lamentations of the Flame Princess axiom that the demi humans are fading from the Earth. That doesn't mean that their going quietly or nicely about it either. 

The Silk Road could offer hope & opportunity at least that's what the players might think! The truth is that the march & boots of history is going to pave over many cities, races, and culture. There's one name that echoes through the ages for a reason & that's the Great Khane. Merchants may be the spreaders of culture but the Khanes forces are the great equalizer along the silk road. Everything from the Caspin sea to the shores of China feel his forces presence. 

Wizards, mages, and even many of the treasures of mankind are going to find their way into the Khan's vaults, & coffers. So many of the treasures of myth & legend are going to fold themselves through adventures into the Khan's hands. According to a quick History Channel snap shot here, "Genghis Khan conquered more than twice as much land as any other person in history, bringing Eastern and Western civilizations into contact in the process. His descendants, including Ogodei and Khubilai, were also prolific conquerors, taking control of Eastern Europe, the Middle East and the rest of China, among other places. The Mongols even invaded Japan and Java before their empire broke apart in the 14th century. Genghis Khan’s last ruling descendant was finally deposed in 1920."

So history basically gives the DM a wide latitude when it comes to legendary objects & treasures found along the Silk Road. 

The fact is that Sword & Caravan gives a pretty solid table of random treasures & loot major as well as minor to use within your games. The question is how many of these disappeared into the Khan's vaults never to be seen again?! 

A Sword & Caravan rpg campaign would have to be the right mix of styles & setting details with the PC's being a mix of treasure seekers & merchants. And there are several adventures that could be woven into a very dangerous mix for said adventurers especially if one was using LoFP. Zzarchov Kowolski's Pale Lady having just the right mix of Eastern as well as Western influences. And yes I know all about about Kowolski's other adventures & efforts. The Pale Lady stands out with it's other wordly & fairy tale on acid atmosphere. Why?! Because of the fact that I'm trying to stick with a bit of an LoFP theme here. 

The Pale Lady fits the Slavic & Silk Road weirdness factor in spades. The rabbit men, the Pale Lady, etc. doesn't need an explaination only to be placed & run on the Silk Road as a part of the mythic Indo European landscape. How & why?! Well get into that next time. 

OSR Thoughts On Rpg Pundit's Sword & Caravan From Mad Scribe Games For The Lion & Dragon rpg

" Sword & Caravan is an OSR setting book for playing a historically accurate fantasy campaign set in the East along the region known as "the Silk Road" at the turn of the 12th/13th Centuries. This historic campaign's timeline is set amid the turbulent era between the Third Crusade and the Mongol Invasions. This marked Europe's earliest period of post-classical interaction with the East."

 

 

"As Players, you may decide to take on the roles of crusaders, merchants, or explorers traveling to ancient and mysterious lands. Alternatively, you may choose from any number of unique character concepts native to those lands."

 "With a detailed gazetteer of every region along the Silk Road from the Crusader States and the Muslim world to China, Sword & Caravan gives you everything you need to explore the history and varied cultures of a region filled with war, intrigue, commerce, and conquests."

Rpg Pundit's Sword & Caravan supplement is a huge expansion for the Lion & Dragon rpg moving the game into the era of the Silk Road. Sword & Caravan clocks in at around almost two hundred pages of history, new classes, & much more for the  Lion & Dragon rpg.  And while it's meant for the Lion & Dragon rpg Sword & Caravan could be used with DOM Publishing's Fantastic Heroes & Witchery as well. This could be a sorta of backdoor way of going especially with those already using  Dark Albion as thier primary campaign setting. This of course would be an alternative history way of handling adventure elements. 
Sword & Caravan's 12/13th centuries are an extremely  dangerous time in Europe & Asia with entire cities being wiped off of the European map. DOM publishing's Fantastic Heroes & Witchery  would be a far more dark fantasy centered Europe with many of the tools of Dark Albion coming into play to leverage play. 

While the history within the  Sword & Caravan supplement is front & center many of these titles are also a type of tool box approach to their contents. The DM can mix & match as the adventure  situation & the player's wishes dictates for their campaigns. The biggest change within  Sword & Caravan  is the role in which social interaction, commerce, and merchants play within an OSR setting. Yes dungeon crawling is a huge part of the equation but the party is far more mobile with the exploration of strange & alien cultures being front & center. There is nothing stopping a DM from using demi human races within a Sword & Caravan campaign. And yes the human centric element is front & center. There are many DM whom I heard from who are taking the traditional approach of using Sword & Caravan with demi human or humanoid elements. Many DM's have cited Michael Moorcock's alternative historical fiction books as being an element of this sorta of a tradition old school campaign. 

The truth is that the Silk Road presents it's own unique challenges for the DM who wants to move to a 12/13th century campaign model. Sword & Caravan certainly has the right tools for the job. My own Italian merchant character who is just starting out from an upper middle class family has his own set of challenges especially navigating both the dynamics of family politics & the Islamic world of this time. 

This is a very interesting mix to say the least & lately given my propensity for getting out from behind the screen. There's going to be more then a bit of hesitation on my part. With that being said, Sword & Caravan has some excellent tools for PC generation & much more. 
With that being said could Sword & Caravan be used with other OSR rpg's or titles?! The first one that springs to mind of course is Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg. And given the period of the Silk Road's occupation?! The short answer of course is yes! 

Sword & Caravan would be a powerful tool for a LoFP campaign given all of the weird elements, dangerous NPC factions, & much more. But there will have be some adjustment when it comes to some minor gaming or rpg mechanics. And some of these same adventure & DMing elements also come into play with Lion & Dragon as the era's completely change & move according historical motives. 

Given the amount of material in both Dark Albion & Lion & Dragon it's easy to see the pivot points for a DM looking to increase their chances of  successful Sword & Caravan campaign with the Rpg Pundit presents supplemental material. While not necessary these periodicals certainly enhance the chances of a successful campaign. The step to run a Sword & Caravan campaign is a big one given the mountain of information that is provided to the DM. This isn't a bad thing at all & the book does give more then it takes from an OSR dungeon master. Sword & Caravan is an excellent addition to the OSR DM's arsenal & an excellent book. 

Rpg Pundit's Sword & Caravan From Mad Scribe Games For The Lion & Dragon rpg Is Available Right Here 

Rage & Ruin - The Return of Dark Albion's 'Elves' Added 'One Shot' Campaign Commentary

 

This blog entry is going to pick right up from yesterday's blog enrty here.  If we're going to talk really nasty & dangerous antgonist NPC's in a Fantastic Heroes & Witchery rpg campaign then we're gonna have to talk about the fact that Dark Albion's Elves are evil incarnate. And 'the RPGPundit Presents: The Old School Companion 1' From Spectre Press brings this fact home in spades. 

Because when it comes to the Elves of  Dark Albion you are looking face to face with the true servants of Chaos with a capital 'C'. These things are baby stealing, soul munching, soul draining horrors from beyond the pale who once ruled most of Europe. And they'd love to again. The ruins & remains of the Elves are scattered all over Dark Europe. And its this fact that seems to drive scholars crazy because the reality of the Elves of legend seems to be fading. Because they were exiled to the 'Twilight Realm' according to 'The Old School Campanion. But if we look into Wiki's Elves entry the following comes up; "

Identifying elves with the demons of Judaeo-Christian-Mediterranean tradition.^[9] For example:

• In English-language material: in the Royal Prayer Book from c. 900, elf appears as a gloss for "Satan".^[10] In the late-fourteenth-century Wife of Bath's Tale, Geoffrey Chaucer equates male elves with incubi (demons which rape sleeping women).^[11] In the early modern Scottish witchcraft trials, witnesses' descriptions of encounters with elves were often interpreted by prosecutors as encounters with the Devil.^[12]
• In medieval Iceland, Snorri Sturluson wrote in his Prose Edda of ljósálfar and dökkálfar ('light-elves and dark-elves'), the ljósálfar living in the heavens and the dökkálfar under the earth. The consensus of modern scholarship is that Snorri's elves are based on angels and demons of Christian cosmology.^[13]

Elves appear as demonic forces widely in medieval and early modern English, German, and Scandinavian prayers"
This cement's the Elves of Dark Albion as something between demonic & Fairy, perhaps one of the left over races of the Pagan gods not destroyed during the Biblical Flood. And how does this squire with D&D Elves?! It doesn't & nor does it have to. 
The Elves of D&D fare are actually cattle to the true Elves of Dark Albion. The Dark Albion Elves have passed themselves off as 'pagan gods' and took full advantage of local populations while feeding enmass under the cover of plague or disaease; "Scholars have at times also tried to explain beliefs in elves as being inspired by people suffering certain kinds of illnesses (such as Williams syndrome).^[28] Elves were certainly often seen as a cause of illness, and indeed the English word oaf seems to have originated as a form of elf: the word elf came to mean 'changeling left by an elf' and then, because changelings were noted for their failure to thrive, to its modern sense 'a fool, a stupid person; a large, clumsy man or boy'.^[29] However, it again seems unlikely that the origin of beliefs in elves itself is to be explained by people's encounters with objectively real people affected by disease." 
And so this brings up the fact that perhaps the island of California has one or two Elven holdings. I haven't even remotely addressed the fact that both Drow & Elves will instinctively hate with a vengence these ancient Albion Elves. But there's a Chaos cult or two that has foot holds in these areas. 

So how will I be explaining this switch up of power from the serpent men?! I'm not because power vaccuums in D&D or AD&D are filled all of the time. And these Dark Albion Elves often pass themselves off as Pagan gods. They are quite capable of causing mayhem to anyone or anything they come across. 

Fantastic Heroes & Witchery One Shot - Dave Cooks's I1: "Dwellers of the Forbidden City" (1981)

One of the things that happens when you deal with a changing roster of players is the fact that players come & go. But certain game systems remain & in these is the fact that I always turn back to eventually and so it is with Fantastic Heroes & Witchery rpg.  Each & every time that Fantastic Heroes & Witchery comes up is the fact that Dark Albion also comes up into the mix. 

And one of the ideas that comes up is that Albion has before the Rose War an expansionist & discovery based trade economy. The Rose War comes along & all of that halts & the economy of Europe stalls or so it seems. But what the Hell happened to those exploratory expeditions?! Well it brings up one of my favorite old school campaign set ups  'the castaways '.

The idea of the 'Castaways' campaign is a group of misfit characters from old school & OSR resources find themselves on a 'deserted' isle and all is not as it seems. And yes this isn't original at all & owes more then a glancing blow from X1 Island of Dread by Cook & Moldvay. But to be honest we've  done X1 Isle of Dread to death. And possibly I'm thinking of Dave Cooks's  I1: "Dwellers of the Forbidden City" (1981) instead. 

And there's a couple of reasons for this, one is the fact that the island might be more then just a simple island & instead be a part of the island of California instead. My version of Dave Cooks's  I1: "Dwellers of the Forbidden City" (1981) was originally a serpent men colony and it was taken over by the humans until the serpent men took it back. And now they in turn are having to deal with inhuman populations from the mainland. 

Add into the mix PC's & stir gentility until they begin to make their way in land & then all Hell breaks loose. And is this a possible old school module location where I could add in Dark Albion's Frog royals as a possible hidden faction?! More as this develops.