Arduin,Barsoom,& Tegel Manor - Worlds Without Number & Cities Without Number Rpg

Over the years Worlds Without Number continues to come up on the pile of books that needs to be exploited. Now with the release of Cities Without Number it's time to put some of our campaigns ideas into focus from of the past. Campaigns I've run in the past especially with Tegel Manor. 

Martin Ralya from a 2014  Rpg Geek entry  captures what makes Tegel Manor so damn good in his comments; "This is such a cool module. One paragraph of backstory, and then straight to the funhouse -- and what a funhouse it is: dozens of rooms, a separate dungeon, portraits with magical effects, monsters jammed into every corner, magical statues, and weird encounter after weird encounter. Every room gets just a sentence or two of description, the sort of brevity I love in modules.

The huge map of the manor is fantastic, as is the player map showing only its outline; that's a nice touch. In 29 pages (discounting the covers and table of contents), plus a map, this module covers a tremendous amount of ground. It feels much, much longer than that.

Tegel Manor is nutty as a fruitcake, and I love it. It looks like a hoot to play, and would take a good many sessions to explore fully.

Added bonus: best typo in a module ever, "sunopsises" for "synopses.""

Our Tegel Manor was a time and planar jumping haunted fun house of horror that moved from one plane to another. The valley and all of the environs of the haunted house travelled with it. We had a brief run recently with it. 

Lately it's got me thinking about Worlds Without Number & the fact that the manor figured so high within our Mars/Barsoom games in the past. 

Now if the manor can appear anywhere. Could this massive haunted house appear within a massive cyberpunk urban cityscape & yes I'm thinking about a massive urban crawl using Cities Without Number with classic Tegel Manor. 
So if the manor wanders across time & space & we've had portals to Barsoom near the manor in the past. Then it makes perfect sense that these portals would also crossover with the Nexus gates of Arduin. 

Now in the past I've had the manor appear on a post apocalpytic Empire of the Petal Throne Mars via the  same gateway that  opens onto the Mars of Empire of the Petal Throne's Rpg via Brett Slocum's Warriors of The Lost Planet free Warriors of the Red Planet Add on campaign book.  And this goes back into my own take on the classic Barsoomian books. 

  

'Serpent Men On Mars!' - OSR Commentary On 'Sea Kings of Mars' from Thrilling Wonder Stories v34n02 (1949 06) & The 'Old Mars' Campaign Setting

 This post is going to pick right up from my 2019 post on this blog entry here " Further OSR Commentary On The Free 'Old Mars' Downloads For Your Old School Campaigns"

Download & Read Sea Kings of Mars Here

A quick rereading of  a copy of Sea Kings of Mars from Thrilling Wonder Stories v34n02 (1949 06) is one of Leigh Brackett's best.  Brackett's  writing about the serpentmen of Mars that's brought home one of my favorite villain races of Mars.  The Dhuvians, aka the Serpent Men: these are hated and feared by all Martians, these masters of super science were taught these forbidden knowleges by the very 'gods' themselves. Rhiannon being one of the Quiru, “hero gods who were human but superhuman.”  
Sea Kings has plenty of elements of Sword & Planet that can easily be brought into a campaign such as  the Tomb of Rhiannon,itself filled with all manner of bizarre super science weapons & devices. Its the fact that behind the Sark Empire of cruelty are the Dhuvians. And these serpent men have the cooperation of a 'god'. 
Sure the hero & the love interest both triumph over the odds in Sea Kings of Mars. It begs the question what happened to the the Dhuvians?! 
For my own post apocalytic Mars they woke up after the bombs fell & really got things really nasty from there. There are two OSR resources that I used for my own campaign when it comes to  the Dhuvians.  Oldskull Serpent Folk from Oldskull, aka Kent David Kelly has been my go to source for these guys. This book by itself has everything a DM needs to really bring home these serpent men villains. 

And when it comes to the Dhuvians then we've also got Gregorius21778: Ssssnake-Men! This product was  used to represent different tribal nations of serpentmen across their Martian empire. 

The Dhuvians  are going to be major antagonistic force in our upcoming campaign acting as villains & vile NPC's coming up! 

Updating Old Mars - A Warriors of The Red Planet & Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Hybrid Campaign

 So let's begin with why I'm doing this thought exercise? My co dungeon master wanted to play a Hyperborean PC but was a bit disappointed that Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea didn't have a psionic system. So why not use Richard Le Blanc's  PX1 Basic Psionics Handbook? It didn't have cinematic feel that we're looking for. PX1 Basic Psionics Handbook is one of the best books on the OSR market for its classic old school mind reading niche. No, I'm looking for something slightly different here more in line with the classic sword & sorcery mentalists & mind readers. So it started bothering me for some days & so I let it go & shelved the minor OSR quibble at the back of my mind. Then I started thinking about Clark Aston Smith's Martian Cycle.

Smith's Martian cycle starts with a story many consider not part of the Mars cycle at all ;“The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis”Completed August 1931. First published in Weird Tales, May 1932. Next comes “The Dweller in the Gulf” Completed August 1932. First published in edited form as “Dweller in Martian Depths” in Wonder Stories, March 1933. Unedited version first published in The Abominations of Yondo, Arkham House 1960. Finally we get to “Vulthoom”Completed February 1933. First published in Weird Tales, September 1935.
This is an old and very dangerous world hoary with age, horror, and alien Lovecraftian gods dwelling in its underworld.



So then I started thinking about the Warriors of the Red Planet rpg, & I grabbed my copy of the book from the stacks & quickly started thumbing through it. I looked specifically at the mentalist PC class. The game book on the back has a blurb that caught my eye.And with use with other 'old school' retroclones. Hmm  



If we look at the classes in Warriors of the Red Planet, Fighting Men, Scoundrels, Mentalists, & Scientists its easy to see their D&D equivalents. The Fighting Man is Fighter, Scoundrels are Thieves, Mentalists are clerics sort of, & Scientists are Magic Users or Wizards. So it would stand to reason that we could easily port the bare bones of the WRP's PC classes over to another game or a back bone system as I call it. In this case Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. In fact with a little bit of work because of the separation of race & class it wouldn't be too hard to take the races of  Warriors of the Red Planet and use them as the base races for the classes of AS&SH. But why do this? One word Mars!


Since AS&SH take place in the far future then it might be simply a step away from the Hyperborea through the Borea Winds onto the world of Mars. But is this the Mars of pulp future or more specifically a post Colonial Mars of Burroughs, the Northwest Smith stories (1933–1936) by C. L. Moore & the Mars stories   published between 1940 and 1964 by Leigh Brackett. This is a gritty, down, and dirty Mars with all of the trappings of sword & planet mixed with sword & sorcery.
This is a world that has seen cycles of empire for millions of years going all the way back to its Lovecraftian roots. "Brackett's The Sword of Rhiannon (1953) shows an oceanic Mars of the distant past, and comes close to pure fantasy."

The Mars of Clark Aston Smith lays below the surface in the underworld, sleeping and dreaming. It waits for the unwary & foolish stumble upon its secrets they wait in their low land caves and caverns waiting. Ancient cults, Martian alien organizations, and clans keep these ancient forbidden traditions alive.  For running such a campaign a mix of the pulpy AS&SH monsters and WRP's creatures are suggested.


This is a world where mankind has made his mark & then stumbled into the fires of his own nuclear fall from grace. There are space ports here and there, a few human city states but the Martian races have re emerged on Mars from hidden valleys & scattered colonies across the face of Mars. There are ancient Lovecraftian horrors & gods that rule as they have for billions of years scattered in certain countries across the face of this world. This is world where the sword is king & you need to keep your radium side arm handy. Mutants, ancient evils, and worse await you in the red night.

The Works Of Clark Aston
Smith Can Be Read HERE


Note that this is for personal use only and is not an attempt to violate the copyright or trademark of The Warriors of the Red Planet rpg or The Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea.  Neither is this an attempt to violate the trademarks nor copyrights of the authors named. Sword and Stitchery would like to thank the Elder Dark Website for their continued work on the behalf of Clark Aston Smith. All material herein comes under the heading of fair use.

Ideas & opinions to follow are the copyright & trademark of the author & Dark Corner Productions

Arduin,Barsoom,& Tegel Manor - Deadly Campaign Connections In My Castles & Crusades Game

Deodanth concept art by Greg Espinosa for the Arduin Monster Cards,1977
Nothing exists in isolation & I haven't canceled a game in months but today because of work I've had to. We're very busy & its getting to be a bit much for me. So I went ahead & last night after taking on so much sewing machine repair work. But there's an Arduin side came up in my Tegel Manor campaign notes! Arduin itself is a world of planar doors & there's been lots of campaign interaction between Greyhawk, Arduin, & Tegel Manor going back years in our games. The dimensional wandering Tegel Manor spreads its evil across the planes subtly. The Rumps infiltrating & investing in many ventures & their corruption turns up in the most surprising places.



That's right there's a blood feud between my bard player's PC & a group of deodanth bounty hunters going back to 2019.  The bard has a death wish & wants revenge on these after the bounty hunters were hired by certain powers of Cha'alt black pyramid. Yes there's a horde of bounty hunters roaming the planes with the PC's wanted posters in their back pockets. 


Then in my wanderings across the internet I stumbled across this video which brought home using certain aspects of Arduin. This a brief but concise video of many of the Arduin products of yesteryear.

But how does one go about using Arduin with Castles & Crusades?! This is a Swords & Wizardry homage to the original Arduin & its free! Completely  compatible with Swords & Wizardry, fast, its free, & its very easy to use!

For the Castles & Crusades crowd that wants to use a Deodanth hit squad I recommend the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition states over at the Underworld Cleaning Service blog from 2012. 
Now with the original Judge's Guild  Tegel Manor there's another lesser know Edgar Rice Burroughs Barsoom book  aspect to JG's Tegel Manor. There's a group of Green Martian Warriors that were roaming & fighting in the original random encounter charts!


So someplace on the Manor grounds there's a planar  portal Barsoom & I as the dungeon master have been taking full advantage over the years to slip in the occasional Warriors of the Red Planet rpg monster. But this isn't the only Mars I've slipped in under the player's noses. There's a bit more Barsoom with a group of NPC adventurers whose make up is straight outta of Jason Vey's conversion of Doc's OD&D Mars material.  All of these remind me of the classic Frazetta covers from my youth.


This same gateway opens onto the Mars of Empire of the Petal Throne's Rpg via Brett Slocum's Warriors of The Lost Planet free Warriors of the Red Planet Add on campaign book. 



This is my homage to my uncle's Empire of the Petal Throne rpg campaign that we played in '84 through '91. All of these elements are cross compatible with the science fictional/science fantasy elements found in the Castle Keeper's Guide. 



Now what does this have to do with lich lord The Duke De Lamont & his connection's to the Prussian's special projects division?! How will the players react to all of this via their PC's?! I'm gonna have to wait till next week to find out! There's a ton of stuff happening & my players are down with all of it. 

Black Roads & Deodanths of Destruction - Play Session Report Cha'alt/Godbound Campaign

Today's  Godbound/Cha'alt game has been an adventure unto itself. The Corona virus scare has made my gaming & even blogging very interesting in Connecticut. Half of my day was gathering supplies,shopping, & then finally settling in for my usual Friday night game. In tonight's game I have a gang of Deodanth acting as a  hit squad warriors to take out the party. The Deodanths are working for the Egg of Coot. They've been tracking the party for the better part of three months. 
Dealing with these Deodanth took up a good proportion of the evening. The Deodanths had replaced a good portion of the dragon king's soldiers & almost succeeding in doing in the party. 


The Deodanths in tonight's games came from the Underworld Cleaning Service blog from 2012. The most evil race of nasties this side of bloody,bloody, Arduin. We had encountered a Deodanth war party.
 The Deodanths are a race of chaotic evil undead, demonic, Elven/catmen race  created as a biological weapon from the  far future by an unknown power. They have been sent back or escaped back in time to the Arduin campaign setting/multiverse.


Deodanth concept art by Greg Espinosa for the Arduin Monster Cards,1977

The in my experience Deodanths are truly nasty customers & should never be underestimated in any way,shape, or form.. Now if I was going to run Arduin then I'd want to run it smooth, simple, & OSR quick. That brings me to  J. Miskimen's Ruins of Arduin. This is a Swords & Wizardry homage to the original Arduin & its free! Completely  compatible with Swords & Wizardry, fast, its free, & its very easy to use!



The deodanths infiltrated the mob that was attacking the walls of the dragon king's city state. The walls of the city state were attacked by clock work cybernetic zombies working for the Egg as fodder. The zombies senses were connected to the Egg itself.


Deodanth with trophy head available from Emperor's Choice Games here. 
Off in the distance a cackling cybernetic presence tries to open a night road below the castle's walls but the PC's weren't having it. The portal mage fought off the attack as a horde of deodanth knights were prepared to mob our heroes.

The gods of the black pyramid are amused & are using the Egg of Coot in their machinations but what will happen coming!? 

The Deodanth Gamit & The Free Swords & Wizardry Book J. Miskimen's Ruins of Arduin

So last night I was sitting around with DM Steve at the usual watering hole & we were going over my notes for the upcoming Las Vagas Godbound/Cha'alt game. He's thumbing through Cha'alt & comes in with there's too many God damn Elves in this game! And this starts us off on a discussion about original Dungeons & Dragons & Advanced Dungeons's PC Elven race. This gets us involved in our running through Judge's Guild's Portals of Tosh in high school & our party of adventurers had escaped through a teleportation device! We found ourselves on a world of humans & lizardmen with a smattering of humanoid races. There's two towns one lizard man & one human plus the wizard lizard's tower. Just outside of the wizard lizard's tower is where we encounter them!  The most evil race of nasties this side of bloody,bloody, Arduin. We had encountered a Deodanth war party.
 The Deodanths are a race of chaotic evil undead, demonic, Elven/catmen race  created as a biological weapon from the  far future by an unknown power. They have been sent back or escaped back in time to the Arduin campaign setting/multiverse.


Deodanth concept art by Greg Espinosa for the Arduin Monster Cards,1977

We never got to complete Judge's Guild's Portals of Tosh  & instead our party of adventurers  got slaughtered, tortured for days, the Elves in our party were killed to a man, & some of the human's organs were taken for trophies. Now why had this happened?! Well its probably because certain clitches within the players were taking Elven PC's for almost every game cycle.
My uncle at that point had had it with the PC Elves & wanted some variety in his games. Or perhaps he just wanted to wipe out the cocky kids once in awhile using Arduin. Now if I was going to run Arduin then I'd want to run it smooth, simple, & OSR quick. That brings me to  J. Miskimen's Ruins of Arduin. This is a Swords & Wizardry homage to the original Arduin & its free! Completly  compatible with Swords & Wizardry, fast, its free, & its very easy to use!


Now lately I've been getting a lot of flack because supposedly I haven't been supporting Castles & Crusades. This is utter drek & not true at all. For the Castles & Crusades crowd that wants to use a Deodanth hit squad I recommend the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition states over at the Underworld Cleaning Service blog from 2012. 

In my experience Deodanths are truly nasty customers & should never be underestimated in any way,shape, or form. But are they going into my current campaign? Well of course! I've also got an encounter written up for the upcoming game! 


Deodanth with trophy head available from Emperor's Choice Games here. 

Bloody, bloody, Arduin forever!

Further OSR Commentary On The Free 'Old Mars' Downloads For Your Old School Campaigns

So I'm making some notes and doing some adjustments to my Old Mars material, this means cracking open one of my favorites by Leigh Brackett, Clark Ashton Smith, and C.L. Moore. Here's some thoughts and ideas for background on my next cycle of 'Old Mars' adventure setting material.

For me cracking open a copy of Sea Kings of Mars from Thrilling Wonder Stories v34n02 (1949 06) is pretty much like coming home. The thing is Mars has always been my favorite adventure location since I was a kid. The dead sea bottoms, the desert sands, & the places where John Carter would never be caught dead in are all true of Leigh Brackett's stories of Mars.



Download & Read Sea Kings of Mars Here

This is a rough & ready Mars of the Colonial era where the ancient past is intruding on and bursting into the reality of humanity's push into the solar system. There are connections here that Brackett makes with Atlantis, Lomar, and many of the other Lovecraft circle writer's creations. This isn't as small of a novella as it seems. There are connections, adventure hooks, ideas, and more if the DM is willing to put some time into the novel.
Leigh Brackett's Mars is far more clannish, dangerous, and in some cases alien then what we've seen in Edgar Rice Burroughs or is it? Barsoom has its own feel very similar to the samurai states of Japan on  Earth just before the incursion of the West. Brackett's Mars is the back alleys & shifting sands of clans thrown about by the coming of the humans. This is an old world that has seen far more then the violent more recent cycles of Earth. The ancient past isn't done with the present of Mars by a long shot. The ancient alien remains of Mars are still out in the hidden valleys, weird lost worlds, and in the interior world waiting for their chance to live & thrive again.
In this regard it reminds me of Clark Ashton Smith's Mars cycle, the humans have come to the dying world of Mars. The human see themselves playing tourists taking over from the ancient dying Martian race as they trade baubles in Igarth's 'old quarter'. But  'The Aihai' old beyond time and preserved by the machinations of the plant like Old One Vulthoom and its siblings. These novellas and stories represent not as different a Mars as one might think from Sea Kings.

• Dweller in the Gulf, The (1933)
• Mnemoka (1955) Fragment
• Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, The (1931)
• Vulthoom (1935)
• Seedling of Mars or The Planet Entity [plot by - E M Johnson] (1931)

Humans are the intruders here & they are colonizing and dabbling in places that have seen far older races to be sure. But is there enough room for E.R. Burroughs's multi colored races, Brackett's Martian races, & Clark Ashton Smith's? Yes from the perspective of looking at the plethora of Martian pulp stories I think that 'Old Mars' is a world that has seen its share of an incredible parade of races with room for more. The Green Martians of Edgar Rice Burroughs didn't stay when the planet went entirely extinct. They fled into the dark of space & continued to be employed out in the far flung corners of the universe.
The far future of Old Mars is going to a very rude awakening for the human population on the planet as the Martians come back with the vengeance of a millions swords and radium pistols. This gets into some of the ancient past implied by C.L. Moore's North West Smith stories.

The horrors of the past seem to leak into & ooze into the future because of the very nature of the Martian mythology. There's a promise of faded glory & future bloodshed just under surface of the Martian stories. This makes me wonder about the far future of this style of Mars is there far more that the Human government is worried about? I think so. The implications of the great push outward seems to have far more bubbling just below the surface. The 'Far Future Old Mars' might be a very alien place indeed highly dangerous and aggressive to human and near human beings. That's a blog post for another time. For the moment I'm organizing my notes and making some adjustments to my upcoming adventures!

This  post is not an attempt to violate the copyrights or trademarks of any 
of the films nor properties named in this post. All ideas are for a 
private table top rpg campaign.  The writing, ideas, and opinions 
are copyrighted and trade marked to the author and Dark Corner 
productions. This post is for entertainment & educational purposes 
only

Using The Free Gamma World Adventure GW5 Rapture Of The Deep As Post Apocalyptic Dungeon Crawl Classic's Wasteland Adventurer Funnel

So I'm speaking with friends last night about the last travesty of my using Legion of Gold as a funnel for a post apocalyptic Dungeon Crawling Classics game using the Crawling Under A Broken Moon rules. So the big complaint that I heard from my friends and players was that they couldn't afford Legion of Gold but loved the ideas of such a funnel. Too bad there isn't a free Gamma World module that could be used in much the same way? Well actually there is! In fact this module has a straight up dangerous high level and very lethal faction from Gamma World introduced way back in an early issue of Dragon magazine. It really doesn't matter which one because everything you need is actually in GW5 and its free. It happens to be for second edition Gamma World and that's really not going to be a problem.

GRAB IT RIGHT HERE 

So what exactly is GW Five Rapture of The Deep and why is it free?
It's a fan made module created to fill the gap in the TSR GW sequence, GW5. For intermediate to advanced players. Here's where the funnel takes place your PC's are some of the victims caught within the attacks happening along the former Florida panhandle.

"A terrible menace from the sea is threatening villages all along the coast. Whole shoreline communities have been disappearing without a trace.
After going through the usual DCC funnel style experience using a bunch of aquatic mutants and their gear, the PC's should have a small side adventure in the ruins of Florida.  Then this bit get's them straight into the action;
"The remaining area inhabitants have banded together and sent for a group of experienced heroes to help. They want to know what could be causing these horrible events, and more importantly, what can be done to put a stop to them. Is it some new terrifying monster from the depths? Or is there something more sinister at work? "
The biggest hurltle the dungeon master and players might have is the use of the underwater rules for DCC but they are out there in the wilds of the internet if you do a bit of research. Here's some that might be of use. 
"The adventurers will travel deep beneath the waves to discover the answer. Can they survive the strange and dangerous ocean depths of Gamma World? Can they solve the mystery before it's too late? " This adventure is an extended campaign for underwater post apocalyptic adventure and there is a ton to encounter and deal with in Rapture of the Deep. This is an underwater sandbox that I've seen several side adventures worked into the background of play over the years and even with DCC it shouldn't be any different.
So that's really the set up for the post apocalyptic DM and his players. The adventure contains a whole plethora of Gamma World underwater madness including: " game master notes, background information, maps, rules for underwater adventuring, new equipment, and over 30 new aquatic creatures."

Rereading through Rapture of the Deep it brought home the opportunities for expansion of several set pieces I've seen used in Gamma World, Mutant Future and other PA games that other DM have used one of which has been floating space ship launch sites controlled by A.I.'s and machine intelligence gods. Many of these ideas were perfect for off of the coast or Florida and Gulf of Mexico, this fits in perfectly with the Merica of Crawling Under A Broken Moon. There are some free resources to that end right over HERE 


Rapture of the Deep features an extensive style of underwater campaigning and this adventure could take months for a group of experienced players to go through. Have several PC's ready and make extensive use of this time to establish an underwater domain or base for PC's because by the time they're done your going to have very high level adventurers at least three or forth level in DCC. If they survive the experience. For myself I used the pattern of the movie Leviathan from 1988 as the pattern for the domain that the players had. A roving under sea mining and scavenging  platform that the PC's managed to free from its A.I. god became they're domain. This same formula could easily work for a DCC game.

GW 5 has its own set of challenges but also an extensive set of rewards and ideas for a range of extended post apocalyptic play. The module remains a favorite of mine. For issues of Crawling Under A Broken Moon that would help I suggest issue #11, 10, 7, UX01: High Caliber Hijinks, and more. Hell just buy the whole damn run and you won't be sorry. More Gamma World and DCC goodness coming up.  

Further OSR Commentary On The Free 'Old Mars' Downloads For Your Old School Campaigns

So I'm making some notes and doing some adjustments to my Old Mars material, this means cracking open one of my favorites by Leigh Brackett, Clark Ashton Smith, and C.L. Moore. Here's some thoughts and ideas for background on my next cycle of 'Old Mars' adventure setting material.

For me cracking open a copy of Sea Kings of Mars from Thrilling Wonder Stories v34n02 (1949 06) is pretty much like coming home. The thing is Mars has always been my favorite adventure location since I was a kid. The dead sea bottoms, the desert sands, & the places where John Carter would never be caught dead in are all true of Leigh Brackett's stories of Mars.



Download & Read Sea Kings of Mars Here

This is a rough & ready Mars of the Colonial era where the ancient past is intruding on and bursting into the reality of humanity's push into the solar system. There are connections here that Brackett makes with Atlantis, Lomar, and many of the other Lovecraft circle writer's creations. This isn't as small of a novella as it seems. There are connections, adventure hooks, ideas, and more if the DM is willing to put some time into the novel.
Leigh Brackett's Mars is far more clannish, dangerous, and in some cases alien then what we've seen in Edgar Rice Burroughs or is it? Barsoom has its own feel very similar to the samurai states of Japan on  Earth just before the incursion of the West. Brackett's Mars is the back alleys & shifting sands of clans thrown about by the coming of the humans. This is an old world that has seen far more then the violent more recent cycles of Earth. The ancient past isn't done with the present of Mars by a long shot. The ancient alien remains of Mars are still out in the hidden valleys, weird lost worlds, and in the interior world waiting for their chance to live & thrive again.
In this regard it reminds me of Clark Ashton Smith's Mars cycle, the humans have come to the dying world of Mars. The human see themselves playing tourists taking over from the ancient dying Martian race as they trade baubles in Igarth's 'old quarter'. But  'The Aihai' old beyond time and preserved by the machinations of the plant like Old One Vulthoom and its siblings. These novellas and stories represent not as different a Mars as one might think from Sea Kings.

• Dweller in the Gulf, The (1933)
• Mnemoka (1955) Fragment
• Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, The (1931)
• Vulthoom (1935)
• Seedling of Mars or The Planet Entity [plot by - E M Johnson] (1931)

Humans are the intruders here & they are colonizing and dabbling in places that have seen far older races to be sure. But is there enough room for E.R. Burroughs's multi colored races, Brackett's Martian races, & Clark Ashton Smith's? Yes from the perspective of looking at the plethora of Martian pulp stories I think that 'Old Mars' is a world that has seen its share of an incredible parade of races with room for more. The Green Martians of Edgar Rice Burroughs didn't stay when the planet went entirely extinct. They fled into the dark of space & continued to be employed out in the far flung corners of the universe.
The far future of Old Mars is going to a very rude awakening for the human population on the planet as the Martians come back with the vengeance of a millions swords and radium pistols. This gets into some of the ancient past implied by C.L. Moore's North West Smith stories.

The horrors of the past seem to leak into & ooze into the future because of the very nature of the Martian mythology. There's a promise of faded glory & future bloodshed just under surface of the Martian stories. This makes me wonder about the far future of this style of Mars is there far more that the Human government is worried about? I think so. The implications of the great push outward seems to have far more bubbling just below the surface. The 'Far Future Old Mars' might be a very alien place indeed highly dangerous and aggressive to human and near human beings. That's a blog post for another time. For the moment I'm organizing my notes and making some adjustments to my upcoming adventures!

This  post is not an attempt to violate the copyrights or trademarks of any 
of the films nor properties named in this post. All ideas are for a 
private table top rpg campaign.  The writing, ideas, and opinions 
are copyrighted and trade marked to the author and Dark Corner 
productions. This post is for entertainment & educational purposes 
only

Encounter With 'The Thoth' An 'Old Mars' Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea & Warriors of the Red Planet Hybrid Campaign Actual Play Event

Tonight I got a chance to get into my Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea & Warriors of the Red Planet hybrid campaign known as 'Old Mars'. The adventurer came across an ancient ragged & ruined city inhabited by strange bird creatures after their sky ship crashed near a weird city. There they came across one of the original races of Mars the 'Thoth'. They opened trade from their minor royal house with the Thoth. Things were very interesting in tonight's game to say the least. Here's some of the background.



 Tonight I've gotten together with my players for my Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea & Warriors of the Red Planet hybrid campaign known as 'Old Mars'. Well, lately I've been rereading a lot of Stanley G. Weinbaum's planetary romances. Wiki as per usual under states the importance of Stanley Grauman Weinbaum (April 4, 1902 – December 14, 1935) to early science fiction writers such as Isaac Asimov  & Arthur C. Clark among many others.

Issac Asimov described Weinbaum's story "A Martian Odyssey" as a hand grenade in the field of early science fictinon;"The story "had the effect on the field of an exploding grenade. With this single story, Weinbaum was instantly recognized as the world's best living science fiction writer, and at once almost every writer in the field tried to imitate him." "His first story, "A Martian Odyssey", was published to great (and enduring) acclaim in July 1934, but he succumbed to lung cancer less than a year and a half later."

YOU CAN GRAB Weinbaum's
story "A Martian Odyssey" HERE
So what exactly is it about the two stories in Weinbaum's Mars that have any enduring impact on Old Mars & why you should pay attention to an early science fiction set of novellas? Well these stories fit the alien criteria of  editor & science fiction guru John W. Campbell. Known as Campbell's dictum, 'write me a creature who thinks as well as a man, or better than a man, but not like a man'."

"A Martian Odyssey" & its follow up "Valley of Dreams" are stand alone Martian science fiction but they dove tail right back into Weinbaum's solar system stories. But I can already hear the groans from certain corners of the OSR, so its very easy to explain how PC's would be encountering the plot points of  A Martian Odyssey. Earth has suffered a devastating cosmic event & has only recently be experimenting again with atomic drives. 

It is only recently that certain human city states have been exploring all of the corners of Mars. Which is where they're likely to encounter Tweel & 'The Thoth'. The 'Thoth' are straight out of A Martian Odyssey;"Early in the 21st century, nearly twenty years after the invention of atomic power and ten years after the first lunar landing, the four-man crew of the Ares has landed on Mars in the Mare Cimmerium. A week after the landing, Dick Jarvis, the ship's American chemist, sets out south in an auxiliary rocket to photograph the landscape. Eight hundred miles out, the engine on Jarvis' rocket gives out, and he crash-lands into one of the Thyle regions. Rather than sit and wait for rescue, Jarvis decides to walk back north to the Ares. Just after crossing into the Mare Chronium, Jarvis comes across a tentacled Martian creature attacking a large birdlike creature. He notices that the birdlike Martian is carrying a bag around its neck, and recognizing it as an intelligent being, saves it from the tentacled monstrosity. The rescued creature refers to itself as Tweel. Tweel accompanies Jarvis on his trip back to the Ares, in the course of which it manages to pick up some English, although Jarvis is unable to make any sense of Tweel's language. At first, Tweel travels in tremendous, city-block-long leaps that end with its long beak buried in the ground, but upon seeing Jarvis trudge along, walks beside him."
The Toth have visited Earth's Egypt in the ancient past or more likely around the time of Alexander The Great. Or during the Roman Revival Period of Egypt. The 'Thoth' are a decedent & declining alien culture by the time the crew of the Ares has contact with Tweel. Yes Thoth is the Greek pronunciation of the Egyptian god's name but then there's that the whole classic argument  I could go over but  that I don't have time to go into.


There are several reasons why "A Martian Odyssey"  is truly important the least of which is the influence it had on Gary Gygax's monster ecology. This fact hasn't escaped other pundits of the hobby.  When we get to Valley of Dreams then we start really getting a snap shot of the extent of the 'Thoth' alien civilization. "Near a canal, the men find a strange, deserted city thousands of years old. The buildings are inhabited by birdlike Martians of Tweel's species, including Tweel himself, and Jarvis and the Martian enjoy a happy reunion. Jarvis persuades Tweel to guide them through the city.

In one building, they come across a ratlike being hunched over a Martian book. Tweel angrily chases the rat-thing away and replaces the book on a shelf, though the Earthmen are not sure whether the rat-thing was reading the book or eating it. Elsewhere in the building, which seems to be a library, Tweel shows the Earthmen a huge mural of a human kneeling before a seated Martian. When Leroy remarks that the Martian in the mural looks like the Egyptian god Thoth, Tweel excitedly repeats the name, pointing to itself and all around them at the city. The Earthmen realize that Tweel's people, the Thoth, had visited ancient Egypt and served as inspiration for the Ibis-headed god. (This is actually anachronistic, since Thoth was the classical Greek version of the god's name."
These ancient Martians seem to have forgotten much of their advanced super science technology & gone right down the slide towards degenerative decline we see so often in Martian races & cultures.

Valley of Dreams by Stanley Grauman Weinbaum Is Available Here For Free

So we've got a truly alien set of humanoids living & working on Mars. The Thoth are perfect fodder for a Clark Ashton Smith solar system.Clark Ashton Smith's Mars is a place of ancient alien decadence & ageless evil. These stories are filled with Smith's Old Mars rulers, races, & the eldritch horror  that hides in the dark. 

• Dweller in the Gulf, The (1933)
• Mnemoka (1955) Fragment
• Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, The (1931)
• Vulthoom (1935)
• Seedling of Mars or The Planet Entity [plot by - E M Johnson] (1931)[An alternative background to the proceeding 4 stories]
   But how could a dungeon master run these stories of planetary sword & terror? The simplest way is too make one area or former empire country setting the confined area of these horrors. Ignarh the capital of C.S. Smith's Mars is a decadent den of ancient inequity & Martian sleazy. The type of place that is perfect for adventurers,outlaws, and type of sword & sorcerous scum that PC's seem to gravitate towards.
  

Its also the sort of a landscape that the Thoth could easily inhabit & not send nary a ripple across the desert sands of Mars. 

The Thoth


No Encountered:3d4 
Alignment: Neutral (with Lawful tendencies)
Size: M 
 Movement 50 (Jump 450) 
Dexterity: 16 
Armor Class: 6
Hit Dice:3 
No of Attacks: 2 Claw/Claw or by weapon
Damage: 1d4/1d4 
Saving Throw 15
Morale:9
Experience Points:120

'The Thoth' are a mysterious & very ancient race of Martian bird like humanoid race that visited Old Earth in the distant past thousands of years ago.  These are creatures of a bygone age of Old Mars, having the characteristics of plants & animals, the Thoth neither sleep nor eat or drink. Instead they draw nutrients & life giving materials. For several hours a day they will encase their trunk like flexible beaks within the Martian soil to feed. Children are produced by budding when two 'Thoth' join during their mating season when buds are produced asexually.
 The Thoth are incredibly agile & dexterous covering many city blocks in one leap or more. They can easily cover Martian cliff sides and valleys with easy. Their flexible beaks acting as breaks to ad in their stopping. 
These creatures although human in appearance are completely alien & have a completely different arrangement of organs with the brain of the Thoth being located in the chest. This arrangement accounts for the armor class of the Thoth. They also have bright feather like coverings that protect them from the incredibly chilly Martian nights. These feather like coverings retract during the day and become invisible. The 'Thoth' are also armed with retractable claws of remarkable sharpness that they will use defensibly if backed into a corner. They can strike for 1d4 points of damage per claw.
The Thoth have an incredibly complex alien language that is represented by whirls, signs, & symbols. These are incredibly difficult for humans to grasp and require four or more Wisdom and Intelligence checks to understand. The Thoth communicate in distinct forms of whistles, clicks, and shrills that certain low land Martian barbarian tribes understand. To the average adventurer it takes years of contact to even grasp the lower forms of this alien language. The Thoth have no trouble grasping common, high and low forms of Hyperborean & many other human languages. Because of their advanced grasp of higher stage logic there is a thirty percent chance of the 'Thoth' being able to unweave any magick spells cast against them. This is an innate ability to the 'Thoth'. The 'Thoth' are 6th level wizards/scientists with innate abilities of magic, higher order alien super science & other alien abilities. 
There were once millions of humanoid 'Thoth' but now only a few thousand remain. They are an incredibly old as well as advanced civilization. Their cities sprawling ruins can still be seen  in certain lost valleys which housed millions of the species. These cities contain many lost relics and weird artifacts of the 'Thoth'. Many of the 'Thoth' cities use an advanced form of solar power, as well chemicals and steam propulsion in weaponry. The 'Thoth' also use an advanced form of alchemy processed  Martian radium they as an ever burning power source. This is known among the Martian human colonists as 'ever burning coal' which it resembles. They use this for an energy and light source for heat. Ever burning coal units are worth 10,000 gold pieces in Martian human city states where they are highly valuable.
The 'Thoth' carry a bizarre firearm made from a transparent glass-like material, which fires poisoned splinters using steam power. These weapons have 1d100 shots when found in clips which must be hand loaded. A 'Thoth' dart gun will have water & the Martian propellant liquid which will mix when the handle is squeezed. Targets must save vs death or poison when hit by a glass dart. The guns have a range of 50 feet & do 1d3 points of damage in addition to the poison's effects. The glass darts are mostly harmless to humans. The darts poison can be easily adjusted by the 'Thoth' to compensate for  human biology.
The 'Thoth' have only recently begun to master the fine art of nuclear power after trading with several of the human city states on 'Old Mars'. There is evidence that as far back as the human Stone Age 'The Thoth' had staggered contact with humanity.

Old Mars Campaign Resources

Old Mars OSR Campaign Evolution - A Warriors of The Red Planet & Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Hybrid Campaign

Sword & Sorcery Solar System & Old Mars Campaign Resource Round Up - Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers Of Hyperborea & Warriors of The Red Planet Hybrid Campaign Resources

 

'Old Mars' Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyprborea & Warriors of The Red Planet Hyrbid Campaign Notes 

 

Commentary On Ass Kicking Warrior Women of The Old Mars Setting

Further Afield 'Old Venus' & 'Old Mercury'

Old Venus A Sword & Sorcery Adventure Setting For Using OSR Resources With The Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Rpg System

Adapting The Free Leigh Brackett's 'The Stellar Legion' Novella To The 'Old Venus' Campaign Setting

 

Adapting The Free Leigh Brackett's 'The Citadel Of Lost Ships' Novella To The 'Old Venus' Campaign Setting

 

Old Mercury Under A Hyperborean Sun - Commentary On Several Free Novellas From Leigh Brackett For The Old Mars Campaign Setting