Thoughts on WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun & The Cults of Tharizdun For A Modern Day OSR Campaign.

  It has many names The Dark God, The Ender, He of Eternal Darkness, the Ebon God, the Black Sun, the Patient One, He Who Waits, the Anathema, the Father of Elder Evils, the elder elemental god, the Author of Wickedness, the Eater of Worlds, the Despised, the Undoer, the Chained God, the Chained Oblivion & it has made the crossing. Since dealing with both my Castles & Crusades Wilderlands of High Fantasy & Victorious rpg campaigns. Veterans of the Supernatural Wars rpg has generated a ton of interest among my players. So an old campaign notebook entry reared its head. Could the cult of Tharizdun present a dangerous and viable threat within a modern day Earth?! "WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun was written by Gary Gygax and published by TSR in 1982 as a thirty-two page booklet with two outer folders; there are no modules with the codes WG1-WG3. ", this is the publication history that we all know. 

We know that the release of Iggwilv & her daughter is going to create two cults at least upon the world both demon worshippers & a vampire cult. But the greater evil maybe lurking in the background of the campaign yet to rear its head & that's Tharizdun. 

Iggwilv is one of the keys to this & to this end I've placed an alternative version of her temple from S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth within  Maple White Land. Her black witch covens would have spread across South America, the lower half of the United States, & even up into the New England States. Why?! Her description gives her ambitions as not being seditary at all; "Iggwilv is said to have two forms, one of which is that of an old crone (said to be her true form), and the other, a human female of dark beauty. In the latter form, Iggwilv has long black hair and pale skin. It is said none who have seen her in her true form still live.^[16]

She has many alternate names. On Oerth she has been called the Witch Queen of Perrenland and the Mother of Witches. She is known as Louhi on one alternate Prime Material Plane world, and as Ychbilch on another. Those close to her sometimes address her as Wilva." 

The real goal would be to suck Earth dry & then move on while releasing  Tharizdun. What would slow both Iggwilv & her daughter would be the fact that they don't share power easily with one another. Gary Gygax's version of Grayhawk had Gord The Rogue travelling the planes as a champion of Balance after a new cat lord was inserted into his place; ""Evening Odds" appears as story 14 in Pawn of Chaos: Tales of the Eternal Champion, an anthology of fiction inspired by Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion mythos. The story takes place some time after the events of Dance of Demons. Gord has apparently been deposed from his position as the new Catlord and is traveling the alternate realities as a Champion of Balance. In the course of the story he upsets a plot by the archfiend Baphomet on modern Earth." 

This places Gary Gygax's Greyhawk near to the Prime Material plane.  In fact that it also places The Wildlands of High Fantay near the planes Prime as well.
 Several magazine articles in Peagus magazine the Judges Guild house magazine have the Wilderlands cross over near Earth's sphere. This very idea makes Earth a prime hunting ground for a number of Dungeons & Dragons monsters. 

Tharizdun might already be touching a piece of the Earth's plane within this campaign world version of  WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun. The cult of Tharizdun would rely on its inner circle members to be nilistic & dangerous undead fantics. Fanatics who would do anything to further their various masters agendas. There are plenty of idiots who would fall for the false promise of immortality that undeath brings. So the ranks of these cults would swell like a disease sweeping across the world. We've seen this type of event time & again within our modern world. Right now its just spit balling ideas out here: 

1. A party of adventurers is brought together from  across the planes & Earth by the powers of the Balance to stop the destruction from happening. 
2. These cults go to war against one another because of each one wanting to seize power.
3. Those who make a cross over unto Earth risk being stuck here for the rest of their lives.
4. The powers that be use Earth as testing ground for young adventurers. 
5. The hidden & lost places of Earth allow one to cross over into Greyhawk & the Wilderlands. 
6. The minor gods of the Wilderlands can have influence on their agents on Earth. 
7. The occult & the supernatural are a cancer on the planes allowing Chaos & Law to gain foot holds that cause the planes to go out of balance. Thus bringing in exterterminators to hand the problems. 
8. The Gord The Rogue novels show a clear campagin path to bring in classic D&D elements into a campaign setting. 
9. Greyhawk has some excellent campaign points to exploit for the player's PCs & they won't be expecting it. 
10. Standard D&D magic may be much more dangerous on Earth. 

Christmas Carnage - Thoughts on WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun & The Cults of Tharizdun For A Modern Day OSR Campaign.

 It has many names The Dark God, The Ender, He of Eternal Darkness, the Ebon God, the Black Sun, the Patient One, He Who Waits, the Anathema, the Father of Elder Evils, the elder elemental god, the Author of Wickedness, the Eater of Worlds, the Despised, the Undoer, the Chained God, the Chained Oblivion & it has made the crossing. Since dealing with both my Castles & Crusades Wilderlands of High Fantasy & Victorious rpg campaigns. Veterans of the Supernatural Wars rpg has generated a ton of interest among my players. So an old campaign notebook entry reared its head. Could the cult of Tharizdun present a dangerous and viable threat within a modern day Earth?! "WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun was written by Gary Gygax and published by TSR in 1982 as a thirty-two page booklet with two outer folders; there are no modules with the codes WG1-WG3. ", this is the publication history that we all know. 

We know that the release of Iggwilv & her daughter is going to create two cults at least upon the world both demon worshippers & a vampire cult. But the greater evil maybe lurking in the background of the campaign yet to rear its head & that's Tharizdun. 

Iggwilv is one of the keys to this & to this end I've placed an alternative version of her temple from S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth within  Maple White Land. Her black witch covens would have spread across South America, the lower half of the United States, & even up into the New England States. Why?! Her description gives her ambitions as not being seditary at all; "Iggwilv is said to have two forms, one of which is that of an old crone (said to be her true form), and the other, a human female of dark beauty. In the latter form, Iggwilv has long black hair and pale skin. It is said none who have seen her in her true form still live.^[16]

She has many alternate names. On Oerth she has been called the Witch Queen of Perrenland and the Mother of Witches. She is known as Louhi on one alternate Prime Material Plane world, and as Ychbilch on another. Those close to her sometimes address her as Wilva." 

The real goal would be to suck Earth dry & then move on while releasing  Tharizdun. What would slow both Iggwilv & her daughter would be the fact that they don't share power easily with one another. Gary Gygax's version of Grayhawk had Gord The Rogue travelling the planes as a champion of Balance after a new cat lord was inserted into his place; ""Evening Odds" appears as story 14 in Pawn of Chaos: Tales of the Eternal Champion, an anthology of fiction inspired by Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion mythos. The story takes place some time after the events of Dance of Demons. Gord has apparently been deposed from his position as the new Catlord and is traveling the alternate realities as a Champion of Balance. In the course of the story he upsets a plot by the archfiend Baphomet on modern Earth." 

This places Gary Gygax's Greyhawk near to the Prime Material plane.  In fact that it also places The Wildlands of High Fantay near the planes Prime as well.
 Several magazine articles in Peagus magazine the Judges Guild house magazine have the Wilderlands cross over near Earth's sphere. This very idea makes Earth a prime hunting ground for a number of Dungeons & Dragons monsters. 

Tharizdun might already be touching a piece of the Earth's plane within this campaign world version of  WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun. The cult of Tharizdun would rely on its inner circle members to be nilistic & dangerous undead fantics. Fanatics who would do anything to further their various masters agendas. There are plenty of idiots who would fall for the false promise of immortality that undeath brings. So the ranks of these cults would swell like a disease sweeping across the world. We've seen this type of event time & again within our modern world. Right now its just spit balling ideas out here: 

1. A party of adventurers is brought together from  across the planes & Earth by the powers of the Balance to stop the destruction from happening. 
2. These cults go to war against one another because of each one wanting to seize power.
3. Those who make a cross over unto Earth risk being stuck here for the rest of their lives.
4. The powers that be use Earth as testing ground for young adventurers. 
5. The hidden & lost places of Earth allow one to cross over into Greyhawk & the Wilderlands. 
6. The minor gods of the Wilderlands can have influence on their agents on Earth. 
7. The occult & the supernatural are a cancer on the planes allowing Chaos & Law to gain foot holds that cause the planes to go out of balance. Thus bringing in exterterminators to hand the problems. 
8. The Gord The Rogue novels show a clear campagin path to bring in classic D&D elements into a campaign setting. 
9. Greyhawk has some excellent campaign points to exploit for the player's PCs & they won't be expecting it. 
10. Standard D&D magic may be much more dangerous on Earth. 

Immortality Inc. - Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion, The Dungeons & Dragons Cartoon, Venger & Gord The Rogue

"“She yawned. If the Lords of Entropy were to manifest themselves on Earth again as they had in the legendary past she felt she might welcome them as a relief, at least, to her boredom. Not, of course, that she believed in those terrible prehistoric fables, though sometimes she could not help wishing that they had really existed and that she had lived in them, for they must surely have been more colourful and stimulating than this present age, where dull Reason drove bright Romance away: granite scattering mercury.”
― Michael Moorcock, Gloriana"

Venger Artwork  BY  Manzanedo

Used without permission. 

This for me sums up Venger from the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon, a transformed  cambion  sorcerer, conqueror & ruler of a micro plane whose ambitious seem as macro as they do micro. Venger is a creature of his own ambitious whose twisted by his precepts of Chaos. Venger is creature tormented by his own existence in service to an uncaring god of Chaos or an elder evil. The Nameless One is madness itself & Venger's master but is there something more boiling below the surface here?!



Recently I've been doing quite a bit of rereading of Michael Moorcock's books & mythos of the eternal champion. Venger's master the 'Nameless One' seems to have an awful lot in common with some of the darker aspects of the Lords of Chaos or as their known as the Lords of Hell. Venger is a Frank Mentzer  immortal of the 'Nameless One' & the bastard god of madness has kept Venger like an abused  pet for at least a thousand years. I'm not saying that Venger is innocent by default far from it. The Dungeon Master & his son managed to banish the Nameless One prior to the kids arrival in the Realm.. But its Dungeon Master who feels responsible for the current situation Venger's state.

“But people may do great good accidentally, though with evil intentions - conversely people may do great evil though having the best of intentions.”
― Michael Moorcock

The dungeon master is using the kids as rebels against Venger to remind him of his own lost innocence & humanity. They are not the first such heroes there have been many. This is revealed in the series final 'Requiem'

	Everyone makes mistakes... Venger, was mine.
	~ The Dungeon Master's tearful and cryptic message

So the kids are sent back to their own home or stay in the Realm. But this begs the question. Who or what was/is the 'Nameless One'?! I think I might know the answer to this. This goes back to the Moorkcock Stormbringer mythology found in the Kuntz & Ward Deities & Demigods from Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition.

Within we get a fair overview of the Elric Strombringer mythology's deities, artifacts, some monsters,etc. But what also get is the echoes of the lords of Chaos or the Lords of Hell. And its these echoes which explains the 'Nameless One'. The 'Nameless One' is a lord of Hell itself on par with & a contemporary of Tharizdun.
This fan theory falls right in line with WG4: The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun (1982), by Gary Gygax.

"WG4: The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun (1982), by Gary Gygax, was the first (!) adventure in the World of Greyhawk series." Which also might make 'The Realm' an off shoot of Greyhawk. Hear me out here. The Realm is another demi plane or micro plane just off of Oerth. And its actually Gary Gygax's Gord novels that seal the deal for this fan theory;" Dance of Demons is the finale, in which Gord and Gellor enter the Abyss on a mission from the world's most powerful forces of Balance, to retrieve the remaining Theorparts. The goal is nothing less than to free Tharizdun, the long-imprisoned god of ultimate evil and entropy, and to finally destroy him. The novel ends with the complete destruction of Oerth, and the unveiling of a new and better world."

'In Evening Odds' a story that Gary Gygax wrote for the Pawn of Chaos: Tales of the Eternal Champion, an anthology of fiction inspired by Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion mythos. Gord appears as a champion of balance after losing his position as the new cat lord. Gord is  still out in the multiverse with his new partner taking on jobs for the lords & so forth. Was Gord aware of Venger?! Perhaps but I think he considered him small fare. Not worth his time in the long run..

But where does this leave Venger?! Why would he have taken on the deal of damnation to become an immortal of the 'Nameless One'?  Two reasons actually. One is to prove he was a better demi god ruler  then his father the Dungeon Master & he was impatient for immortality. The second reason was to try to use the power of the 'nameless one' for good. His very actions with the 'kids' of the cartoon prove it. Venger is almost 'honorable' in his own twisted way with his straight dealings with the 'kids'. He always tried to deceive them or destroy them for the enchanted artifacts. But now that the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon has concluded where does that leave the 'Nameless One'?! Who then takes on his bargain & becomes the new immortal of the 'Nameless One'?
Of course this could never affect my home campaigns in any way, shape or form right?! After all this is only a fan theory.. Right?! 

OSR Campaign Expansion With 'Castles & Crusades: Brimstone & The Borderhounds RPG Quick Start' & The Book of Powers

For most folks they would be satisfied with simply telling you about a The Castles & Crusades: Brimstone & The Borderhounds RPG Quick Start  yesterday. Brimstone is a bounty hunter in Hell & he his cohorts go gunning for the souls of the damned on Earth. There's a really solid comicbook series that was done on the character of Brimstone.   I compared the concepts to the old Brimstone television show from '98 through '99.  Yes I realize that  Castles & Crusades: Brimstone & The Borderhounds RPG Quick Start  has absolutely nothing to do with the Brimstone television show except for the damned souls bounty hunting aspect.
Then Brim the wrestler whose inside ring persona Brimstone all of this is based contacted me yesterday via email. He's a super nice guy. But this got me thinking long & hard about Castles & Crusades especially some of the notions about demi gods in these games. After speaking at length with Jason Vey about this. I began to read through The Book of Powers for the Amazing Adventures! rpg.  Now what the Hell does any of this have to do with Dungeons & Dragons?! A lot actually, Amazing Adventures is a game of Pulp era adventure that starts in the 1600's buts right up to the 1950's.  Yes,  this includes the Golden age of 1930's Pulps. This gives a whole range of worlds & eras that Brimstone & co. can appear in.



If we dig deeper into Brimstone's origins then it becomes apparent that there's a lot more adventure fodder below the surface then meets the eye;

"Born and raised in Hell, Brimstone is the son of a Janitor of Demonic Forces and a Saxon Warrior Queen. As a child Brimstone knew that he was destined for great things but never seemed to find his niche. He and his Father were abandoned by his mother at the tender age of 20 minutes. Growing up for Brim was hard, being a half-demon/half-human son of a Janitor, Brim had to learn to defend himself from the most vile creatures that reside in the darkest and most evil place in Hell, high school. From High School, Brim went on to join his father in the custodial arts. One day while moving a dumpster from a Infernal Transfer Station (ITS), Brim found a lowly "weeper" (Usually a human soul that cries all the time and proclaims "Why me! I don't deserve this". 9 out of 10 times they deserve it). In a rare moment of tenderness, Brim hid the Weeper and released him past the first gate and let him run into the barren wastelands in search of redemption and salvation away from Hell. Brim let him get at least 100 yards before sniping him through the a calf with his trusty crossbow. He did think twice about sending the Oolog Monster in to rip the rest apart and eat the remains, he sent it anyway. He was bored. A passing Centurion noticed Brimstone's aptitude for dealing with Weepers and offered him a position as a Border Patrol Errant, keeping the population in Hell and preventing souls from getting into the Wastelands. His father did not approve and a large rift formed in their relationship, especially since his father had now become the head honcho of all Hell and began taking his job way too seriously.

In spite of Dad, Brim took to his job like a Hell prawn to a lava pool. In the first month alone, Brim tripled the his quota and even informed on a few of his fellow Errants that were smuggling weepers out into the wastelands and even back into our reality. Praised by his superior, the corporate demon-ass kissing pencil neck geeks, and loathed by his coworkers for basically screwing up the soul curve, Brimstone began making a name for himself in the Border community. Soon Brim shifted into the retrieval department, Autonomous tactical units mandated to retrieve "weepers" that have escaped into the deep wastelands. These units also go by the more common designation, Borderhounds. He was given a small budget and staff and gets to sit around some of the outer borders in his truck looking out for Weepers and other squatters and drinking beer. One day, he caught two Weepers ( A guy and a girl ) trying to get to a transit station. After Brim caught up with them, the girl quickly turned on her male friend and aided Brim in the capture. It seemed she never really wanted to leave and actually was more at home in Hell than she ever was in Delaware, her name was DANIELLE. Brim liked her immediately. They got married and before you know it, they had a couple of kids, DOOM BRINGING YOUNGLING LAMENTOR OF ALL NETHER WORLDS a.k.a. DYLAN and SAMANTHA ( After Danielle's Aunt ). Life seemed to settle down and become routine after a couple centuries.

Around our equivalent of 1977, Brim was patrolling the outskirts of XZA'KIRATA'KI'NOLA'ZI'XQUI'LO'BAI, a big piece of nothing, when he came across an encampment. There he met two big Mexicans, DAWG and LUSCIOUS (had aspirations of being a male stripper at 6' and 300 pounds), just chilling out and drinking beer. Seemed they had arrived in Hell a couple of months earlier and just walked away from the receiving station and into the wasteland to find a place to get drunk and sleep. In their stay in the wasteland they got really friendly with the place, exploring (for chicken and beer), and got to know the local clans and life-forms. Brim took them on as his sidekicks, he pays them usually in imported Country FriedChicken buckets, Beer and Cd's (usually show tunes... don't ask). Brim and his new found buddies quickly garnered a reputation as being one of Hell's best retrieval squads and were given the unit designation XIBALBA. Brim soon had earned enough credits to get himself and his family a nice plot of Hell in a gated wasteland, usually reserved for Serial Killers and Dictators. For Brim, life is a daily routine. He deals with the weepers of the universe and just longs every day to get home to his wife and kids, sit down in front of the idiot box ( a.k.a. TV ), watch reruns of every Wrestlemania, drink beer, and get some from his wife occasionally. "

But this has very little to do with a world & campaign setting such as Dungeons & Dragons Greyhawk. Oh really?! I hate to bring up the Gord The Rogue books by Gary Gygax  but their perfectly attuned Law vs Chaos plot; "Saga of Old City was the first novel in TSR's Greyhawk Adventures series. It starts in Gord's childhood, and ends with his triumphant return to Greyhawk City as a young man and master thief. He learns his trade in the "beggars' guild", and gets involved in the gang war touched off by the beggars encroaching on the official thieves' guild's territory. He travels and has a variety of swashbuckling adventures, ranging from participating in a war to liberating a young noblewoman held hostage.

Artifact of Evil is a continuation of Saga of Old City. This was the final novel under TSR's Greyhawk Adventures banner that was written by Gygax. An ancient artifact is uncovered, whose power could destroy their world. It is up to Gord and his companions to try to stop this artifact of evil from falling into the wrong hands.

Sea of Death, the first of the series published by New Infinities Productions, Inc., has Gord traveling far afield to the Sea of Dust, on a quest for a "Theorpart", hidden in a lost city. He must face rivals sent by demon lords: the psychopathic dwarf Obmi, who serves Zuggtmoy, and the drow priestess Eclavdra, serving Graz'zt. He meets and falls in love with Leda, a clone of Eclavdra. Leda and Gord part at the end of the book as she returns to the Abyss, impersonating Eclavdra in Graz'zt's service for the sake of higher ideals.

Night Arrant is a collection of nine short stories about Gord's adventures, in his early twenties, in the City of Greyhawk.

City of Hawks is a retelling of the events that occurred in Saga of Old City. Gord's rise from simple beggar to master thief are detailed, as is his search for his true heritage.

Come Endless Darkness continues where Sea of Death left off and has Gord continue his quest to stop Tharizdun and Lord Entropy from taking over the Multiverse.

Dance of Demons is the finale, in which Gord and Gellor enter the Abyss on a mission from the world's most powerful forces of Balance, to retrieve the remaining Theorparts. The goal is nothing less than to free Tharizdun, the long-imprisoned god of ultimate evil and entropy, and to finally destroy him. The novel ends with the complete destruction of Oerth, and the unveiling of a new and better world."
After the Gord novels end he gets involved with the war between Chaos & Law; ""At Moonset Blackcat Comes" is an early tale of Gord and his friend Chert the barbarian, in which Gord accepts a mission for the Catlord.

"Evening Odds" appears as story 14 in Pawn of Chaos: Tales of the Eternal Champion, an anthology of fiction inspired by Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion mythos. The story takes place some time after the events of Dance of Demons. Gord has apparently been deposed from his position as the new Catlord and is traveling the alternate realities as a Champion of Balance. In the course of the story he upsets a plot by the archfiend Baphomet on modern Earth."

This is the perfect opportunity to involve  Brimstone & The Borderhounds as  Baphomet minions escape Hell & begin ravaging Earth on some alternative plane Prime Earth. The gods call in the PC's as things spiral outta of control. 

I can already hear the players out there gnashing their teeth about how the player''s PC's need an edge. That's where  The Book of Powers for the Amazing Adventures! rpg. comes in & it allows the player's to play their own demi god half angel or demonic PC's. These are not the over powered engines of destruction that we've seen in other systems. Some of this material was inspired by Nuelow Games Awakened PC material on their blogs. I'm going to be incorporating & boiling this stuff down coming up. All of this gets into the back end of the war between Chaos & Order that we've seen played out in Michael Moorcock's novels, stories, etc. again & again. This whole cloth campaign idea was put into the Deities & Demigods Advanced Dungeons & Dragons book. 

In fact if you want to add in another era or wrinkle I highly suggest Mike Stewart's Victorious rpg for a Victorian era 'supers's setting that can handle the PC's abilities with style as well. Great game & I'm a fan of Mike's design & setting. Now let's say that you want a really good twist on the demigod aspect of this style of campaign & something really different?! 



James Mishler did a solid take on the Demi God race as a PC class for Labyrinth Lord but there's no reason not to use it to make out some real  jerks & criminals of the underworld. Add in the The Book of Powers for the Amazing Adventures! rpg & your gonna have a unique & highly dangerous NPC. 



A very different & terrifying war of Chaos & Order calls perhaps its time that I answer it. The campaign setting is coming together quickly & dangerously. 

OSR Campaign Commentary Greyhawk Memories - The City of Greyhawk by Rick Rose, Carl Sargent, & Douglas Niles.

"Greyhawk - City of High Culture and Low Life!

From the high towers of its grand universities to the rancid alleys of its darkest slums, the City of Greyhawk awaits you. Center of magic and learning in the Flanaess, Greyhawk is also the home of powerful thieves, mighty warriors, traitorous ambassadors, and honest craftsmen.
They all await you within the pages of this information-packed boxed set.

You get four full-size, full-color maps, each depicting a different aspect of the Greyhawk campaign. Two 96-page books give you a detailed overview of the city and a closer look at its more influential citizens - and its more notoriouus criminals."

The year is 1989 & we're in the middle of the golden epic campaign of mythology & opera. Then the bottom dropped out after a friend of mine's parents divorced & devastated our Summer. The latter part of that year saw the release of one of my all time favorite box sets The City of Greyhawk by Rick Rose, Carl Sargent, &  Douglas Niles.


The break down from Wayne's books serves to highlight the innards of this box set & believe me we were excited as both players & dungeon masters;


"* Greyhawk: Gem of the Flanaess - 'A gazetteer of the Free City of Greyhawk and the surrounding area' 96-page softcover.
* Greyhawk: Folk, Feuds, and Factions - 'The good, the bad, and the in-between: People who make the city what it is' 96-page softcover.
* 3 large fold-out maps of the city & environs, and overhead picture of the city.
- 1043XXX0701 Area map (scale: 1 inch = 8 miles)
- 1043XXX0702 City map
- 1043XXX0703 Sewers / secret passages
- [uncoded] pictoral overhead map
* Two-dozen adventure cards, with mini-modules set in the city.":

Its been about a dozen years since I cracked open this box set & its interesting how things are set up & why its laid out the way it is. This box set marks a transition between 1st & 2nd edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons as the design conceits echo throughout the box set. Here factions, & NPC folks are just fleshed out just enough to give the dungeon master lots of latitude to make this setting his or her own. Almost everything here ties in & contrasts  with the grittiness of the Greyhawk Box set.


 Greyhawk: Gem of the Flanaess lives up to its reputation but for us the events of Gord The Rogue novels  kept creeping in. We saw the rise of cults of the Abyss in the furthest  regions of the Flaeness. This was in keeping with the events of the Gord The Rogue series novel Sea of Death by Gary Gygax.  These events would latter on affect my own Stormbringer game as friends & players would transfer their Greyhawk PC's over into our Eternal Champion game. The City of Greyhawk by Rick Rose, Carl Sargent, &  Douglas Niles had far reaching effects as we took the PC's from our The Ring of the Nibelung campaign & brought them forward into the multiverse of the Eternal Champion in '98.



 We had a mix of Viking warriors, mysterious wizards, & one or two low level demigods in the mix. Much of the material that we used came from my uncle's notes. A  heady mix of opera & AD&D elements spun through with lots of Moorcock, Clark Ashton Smith, C.L. Moore, and a healthy dose of Robert Howard thrown into the campaign mix.
Man did we pay for it as vast sums of gold were paid to resurrect the dead PC's. Fortunes gained from gods for relics that we had sweated & bleed over. But Greyhawk always played a central role in these games & still does for me.
Next time we get into where all of this is going? 

OSR Campaign Commentary - Gary Gygax's Gord The Rogue & 'The City Beyond The Gate' AD&D adventure

Its been a long while since I cracked open an issue of Dragon magazine & issue one hundred has as it centerfold adventure one called The City Beyond the Gate for AD&D. I never ran it for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons but instead I ended up running it for the Stormbringer rpg back in 97 or so. The adventure takes a party of Greyhawk adventurers into the heart of modernish day London to recover the Mace of Saint Cuthbert. Its a really well done adventure & it worked out very well for a mixed party of Stormbringer/Hawkmoon rpg adventurers. But looking over my extensive notes for June of '97's Stormbringer conversion game somethings struck me. This was the issue with the first Gary Gygax's  Gord The Rogue story in it. The City Beyond The Gate when we ran it was set after the destruction of Oerth. When the PC's were well aware of the events of Dance of Demons by Gary Gygax. At this point one of the main branches of Greyhawk's Oerth had broken off & been destroyed the wiki entry goes deep into it; "Dance of Demons is the finale, in which Gord and Gellor enter the Abyss on a mission from the world's most powerful forces of Balance, to retrieve the remaining Theorparts. The goal is nothing less than to free Tharizdun, the long-imprisoned god of ultimate evil and entropy, and to finally destroy him. The novel ends with the complete destruction of Oerth, and the unveiling of a new and better world." 



 The PC's met up with Gord later on as an NPC in Miami when they ran into a particularly heinous cult of the archfiend Baphomet on modern Earth. Gord had appeared in an anthology story of the Eternal Champion called Evening Odds . The PC's needed information that Gord had to save their own Oerth from Baphoment's cult & a rather nasty relic left by the Lords of Chaos. ""Evening Odds" appears as story 14 in Pawn of Chaos: Tales of the Eternal Champion, an anthology of fiction inspired by Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion mythos. The story takes place some time after the events of Dance of Demons. Gord has apparently been deposed from his position as the new Catlord and is traveling the alternate realities as a Champion of Balance. In the course of the story he upsets a plot by the archfiend Baphomet on modern Earth."   'The City Beyond the Gate' took place after this on this same Earth when the PC's journey to recover the Mace of Saint Cuthbert.

It was a solid game of Stormbringer & everyone had an excellent time. But it was the fact that I was using a time war as the background of the campaign that I had forgotten about. This allowed me as a dungeon master to use a wide variety of illogical adventure elements & interchange them without consequences. Sure there were a lot of gonzo elements but it allowed me not to be hamstrung by either the Greyhawk or Eternal Champion  mythos elements. This is a situation that I increasingly find myself in today with certain OSR dungeon masters & players  who hew savagely to the Dungeons & Dragons fluff that has built up over the years. I can honestly say that I miss the halcyon days of free wheeling a campaign together. I wonder if I can simply reverse this situation & run 'The City Beyond The Gate' as an OSR Con style one shot game adventure. By keeping the time war elements & pulling in some of the Greyhawk stuff this could work as a campaign buffer adventure in my current campaign line up. Another idea that I have is to take 'The City Beyond The Gate' adventure & run this as a possible Dungeon Crawl Classic filler adventure. The PC's are thrust into the marrow of the adventure & must recover the mace to complete the quest.



Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game – 4th Printing (Peter Mullen cover)

'The City Beyond The Gate' is a high level adventure that pairs Advanced Dungeons & Dragons adventure elements into a modern Eighties style adventure setting. This mix is a heady one for PC's to navigate & I can see using this as a part of a greater arching campaign mix.