Getting A More Lovecraftian Campaign Spin On Leigh Brackett's 'Shadow Over Mars'

" Rick Urquhart was going to conquer the turmoil-ridden planet of Mars. He was penniless and unknown, but there could be no doubt that he would rule the Red Planet-the ancient Martian mystic had made the prophecy, there was no way fate could cheat him of his prize.. "

When we begin looking into the lovely work of the far future of  the Terran Exploitation Company within the bounds of Startling Stories v11n02 [1944-Fall]'s Leigh Brackett's Shadow over Mars. Three things become evident. The Terran Exploitation Company are complete & utter bastards exploiting the ancient Martian races. This corporation is running absolutely scared & they have no idea of the extent of the Martian race's artifcial nature. All of this goes back to my original AS&SH campaign notes from Thursday, August 3, 2017 here on the blog. 

You can download
& read 'The Shadow Over Mars' Right Over Here. 

This one of Brackett's first Martian novels & you can see the plight of the Martians likened to the American Indians in the United States West. Brackett would go on to write a ton of Pulp Westerns. Brackett's Shadow over Mars brings home the fact that there's been race after race that goes back eons on the Red Planet. Her Martians fit John Carter into a pocket of the Martian royalty. Brackett's Martians are thieves, wizards, warriors, & the alleyway runners of an exploited planet. And their fighting for their very existence. 
Mars exploits the hard bitten bastards as her saviors making it a perfect canvas for a party of adventurers. Especially those of Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea. The Hyperboreans have their own part to play in the transformation of the solar system. 
The Terran Exploitation Company seems almost like the 'Company' of the classic 70's film Alien. Out to exploit the conquered planet at any means necessary but Mars has other plans. At some far distant point in the future of Old Earth the Hyperboreans returned according to Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborea cycle & his Zothique cycles.

The humans of 'Shadow Over Mars' are solidly within the sleazy vein of Martian stories, the grungy New Town section with its stripper Venusian girls, 3-D cinemas, and various drug parlors are the perfect metaphor of the Earthman's coming to Mars.  The Terran Exploitation Company knows that their time is almost up & they are scrambling to get all they can outta of Mars as fast as possible. They are perfect rpg fodder to use Night Owl Workshop's Colonial Troopers to stand in as their forces. Mars is not going to give up all of its secrets easily. 

The Terran Exploitation Company knows that when the stars are right then Clark Ashon Smith's  Vulthoom  an alien 'god' (plant like) is going to awaken & then every Terran on Mars is deep trouble. They want to keep the peace with the current crop of Martians but when the new cycle begins they figure they can retreat back to Earth. But can they really?! 

Super Scientists, Sorcerers, & Synthetics - The Curious & Winding History Of The Android on 'Old Mars' & 'Old Venus'

Androids as we know them came about as early as Nineteen Twenty from Czech writer Karel Čapek's play R.U.R. which stands for Rossumovi Univerzální Roboti (Rossum’s Universal Robots);"The play begins in a factory that makes artificial people, called roboti (robots), from synthetic organic matter. They are not exactly robots by the current definition of the term; they are living flesh and blood creatures rather than machinery and are closer to the modern idea of clones, they may be mistaken for humans and can think for themselves. They seem happy to work for humans at first but a robot rebellion leads to the extinction of the human race. Čapek later took a different approach to the same theme in War with the Newts, in which non-humans become a servant class in human society"
These are quite literally vat grown androids but R.U.R was hugely influential in Science Romance circles. And yes Mary Shelly's Frankenstein was the catyslist for all of the automatons to follow including R.U.R. but what does all of this have to do with 'Old Mars' & 'Old Venus'? As we shall see everything. In Clark Aston Smith's Zothique, Hyperborea, and Atlantis cycles respectively there is evidence of his wizards & sorcerers dipping their quills into the vat bred automaton issue. So much so that the Golems of Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea are called automatons. In Warriors of The Red Planet that we get a PC race that are vat grown androids as a viable option for play.

But its once again Edgar Rice Burroughs who puts these flesh & blood creations in the lime light with his Einstein of Martian medicine Ras_Thavas. From organ transplants to full body conversion this gentlemen does it all in the mad scientist gig. He takes on Ulysses Paxton, as his apprentice because of his distrust of fellow Barsoomians.



You can download & read The Master Mind of Mars here.  from Amazing Stories Annual v01n01 (1927) (d Vaughn), this one is one of my favorite versions. Ras Thavas later on reforms and then pops up in the Synthetic Men of Mars when John Carter needs his help after his wife is gravely injured.  
Its really here that we see the true scope of the android or hormad races on 'Old Mars'.
" Synthetic Men of Mars (1939), by which time he has transferred his base to the dead city of Morbus in the Toonolian Marshes. There he has been experimenting in growing monstrous synthetic human beings called hormads. The most intelligent of these turn on him and force him to grow an army of hormads with which to conquer Barsoom. They also force their captive to transplant their brains into the bodies of imprisoned normal Martians. Ras's chance to turn the tables comes when the earthman John Carter, Warlord of Mars and prince of Helium, seeks his surgical aid for his wife Dejah Thoris, injured in an accident. Imprisoned with Ras, Carter and his companion Vor Daj plot with him against the hormads. Vor Daj is given the body of a hormad to spy on their captors; meanwhile, Carter and Ras escape, returning with a great fleet of airships from Helium. Vor Daj is recovered and Morbus, which has been overrun by a huge mass of cancerously growing hormad flesh, is destroyed with incendiary bombs. Ras then restores Vor Daj to his original body.

One hormad, Ras's pupil Pew Mogel, is later revealed in "John Carter and the Giant of Mars" (1940) to have escaped from Morbus and established a new base in the dead city of Korvas, from which he continues to plot world conquest using the scientific skills he gleaned from his mentor. His scheme is defeated by John Carter."
So there's a good chance that if your playing an android on Mars their an escaped homad, no wonder they might be screwed up. They've been hunted at every turn, and nearly killed by their own creator. But all of this goes back to an earlier work of ERB's called The Monster Men. "Cornell University professor Arthur Maxon, who has been experimenting in the creation of artificial life, travels with his daughter Virginia to one of the remote Pamarung Islands in the East Indies to pursue his project." One of his creations gets a hold of Virginia & runs amuck but how exactly did professor Arthur Maxon get a hold of either Ras_Thavasresearch or Rossum’s Universal Robots's materials for his experiments? In an interesting side note American naval vessel arrives; it turns out to be seeking von Horn a minor character & a deserter, to arrest him. An American navel vessel to arrest one deserter? No, I don't think so. Despite the 'happy ending' of the Monster Men I think your looking at two homad style androids Virginia & the protagonist Townsend J. Harper, Jr. whom are both prototype androids created by the good doctor whist he was in the employ of the US Navy. Barsoom has been in communication with Earth for decades using the Barsoomian version of Gridley wave FTL devices. Its a very simple matter to connect the plot points between ERB's various creations.

Dust-jacket illustration of The Monster Men
by J. Allen St. John

When we get into Leigh Brackett's Old Solar System then things get really interesting, I mentioned Ras_Thavas's brain transfers? Well in 1946 Brackett wrote; "Lorelei of the Red Mist, in which the protagonist is a thief called Hugh Starke. Brackett finished the first half before turning it over to Ray Bradbury, so that she could leave to work on The Big Sleep." Hugh Starke has his brain transferred into the body of a warrior called Conan to be used as the cat's paw for a blue breasted sorceress. Yeah, that didn't work out the way she was expecting it. The interesting sword & sorcery bits are the giant Himalayan like mountains in the story, the super science aspects, & the hints of deeper android style technology laying just out of sight of the protagonist.  The novella is still very popular and remains one of the mainstays of Brackett's work. But there's a lot of OSR ground to cover here, for one thing the androids of WoRP are perfect additions as owners of lost kingdoms, guarders of hordes, & guardians of forbidden knowledge. This means that for Adventurer, Conqueror, King they're a nice addition to the roaster possible planetary NPC dangers & they make excellent opponents. 


But there's more here then simply guardians of forbidden secrets angle. Dealing with vat grown or even mechanical monster PC's are not the only player options. There are lots of angles that can be used. One of the other odd little corners of the cybernetic that came out in 1931 is the Jameson Satellite series about a human Professor Jameson whose body is cryopreserved & resurrected by the Zoromes  benevolent full conversion cybernetic aliens. So why mention this series? Because these entities are truly alien & yet fully capable of having all kinds of adventures across the cosmos. These are the type of alien being who would confront the horrors of the Mythos head on. These are not Mythos related stories but they are some old favorites of mine.
You can download the "The Jameson Satellite' here

But what about using androids and sythetics within OSR games is there a readily available PC class that can be used in other OSR games such as OSRIC or Advanced Labyrinth Lord? Well actually yes there is! PC6 - The OSR Android From  Jeremy Reaban 

is perfect for adding an android PC class to your old school games, its designed with other retroclone D&D  versions: original edition, basic and expert edition, and the cyclopedia edition. Its pay what you want and its perfect for adding in a bit of that old ultra cybernetic to your old school games!

But where are the vat grown Andies originate? There are two very Lovecraftian possibilities, one is the Great Race of Yith whose hi jinks with time & space might have them building androids as time probes. The second Lovecrafian race is the Elder Things, think about it. If they can create shoggoths & other bio organic organisms this might be the origin point for all of the vat grown android technology we've discussed so far. 

"Formless protoplasm able to mock and reflect all forms and organs and processes - viscous agglutinations of bubbling cells - rubbery fifteen-foot spheroids infinitely plastic and ductile - slaves of suggestion, builders of cities - more and more sullen, more and more intelligent, more and more amphibious, more and more imitative! Great God! What madness made even those blasphemous Old Ones willing to use and carve such things?"

-H.P. Lovecraft, "At the Mountains of Madness"

So once again this begs the question, are there hidden caches of lost Lovecraftian technology just waiting for PC's in the high mountains of  Old Mars & Venus? I think so & now suddenly the Star Trek Episode, What Little Girls Are Made of makes a bit more sense. There are reasons for this; "Given that the episode in which they appeared was written by horror author Robert Bloch, a fan of horror author H. P. Lovecraft (and wrote frequently for the Cthulhu Mythos), the Old Ones here were based on the Old Ones of Lovecraft's writings. (The Star Trek Compendium, 4th ed., pp. 40-41) Bloch also wrote "Catspaw", which makes reference to another "Old Ones"."  So there could be a number of androids running around your Star Ships & Space Men Second edition games with some very Lovecraftian origin points. 


But who are these 'Old Ones'? Well I think that the Great Race of Yith is a good contender for these folks.
Could androids be found in other venues such as Hyperborea or even Earth? The quick & easy answer is yes. Given the isolated communities, the lone adventurers, & wizard's passion for relic technology. Such a relic as an independent technician android would be invaluable. The Logan's Run television show's Rem was a good example of this sort of an NPC.

Playing an android can be one of the most rewarding but challenging things that a player can do. But there is far more to the synthetics of classic science fantasy then many players realize & that's your in dungeon masters! Happy Rpging! More to come! 

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. None of the ideas or opinions expressed 
in this post are meant to violate the trademarks nor copy rights of any 
of the table top rpgs discussed nor are they in away responsible for the
 thoughts or opinions of the author. 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. 

1d6 Random Treasures & Finds Of The Ancient Lotus Table For Your Old School Campaigns

Deep in the heart of certain Hyperborean ruins are ancient spirits of malevolent intent and dangerous aspect. These horrors are created from those who sucked down the fumes of the black lotus that grew from the corpse farms of Atlantis. These spirits are part of the family of specters created not through violence but the corpse born curse of the Black Lotus corpse flowers. They have energy drain abilities of their ilk because of the dreaded flower's connections with the Black Gulf.



These horrid spirits are addicted to the life forces of humans crave it as gives them a temporary sense of life and reality. These spirits have the appearance of addicts of the most morbid types but their eyes have been replaced by black purple orbs of the void. Their eyes tear with  a tarry black ectoplasm that causes fear & panic for anyone coming within thirty feet of its unnaturalness. Animals will not tolerate its presence at all & kill themselves to flee from it. It is is said that black lotus addiction caused the decline of the Hyperboreans and this often leads to the corpses of black lotus fiends being found with valuables. Black lotus vines are found entwined among the corpse's remains.


Upon 'Old Venus' deep within the swamp lands of the lower valleys there are the 'Spotted Purple Lotus' which grow entwined around the bones of old Hyperborean colonists. This plant only blooms when the star Aldebaran is in the house of 'El' in the Venusian sky. It is found wild among the oldest ruins &  cultivated by the dread lizardmen of Venus. They raise it using corpses of certain potent Venusian chieftains & wizards who consider it an honor to be placed among the fronds of the plants. These corpses become entwined in a mass of the plant until they become guardian monsters animated by the inherit magick of the corpses. 'Spotted Purple Lotus' powder  is worth over 6000 gold pieces per drought. It allows a wizard, druid, or even a necromancer to communicate with the Great Old One known as Sfanomoe. The monster god will grant 1d6 spells to the user but the user must make a 'Charisma' roll to gain such eldritch alien knowledge. Lotus women of Venus often hunt those who have consumed the spotted purple blossom. These horrors can smell its users up to 200 feet away and go into a blood frenzy around the pollen
Because of its strange alien connection to the monster god Sfanomoe 'spotted purple lotus' can cure any poison or radiation damage. But the user or recipient will have 1d10 strange visions as the powder courses through their brain. Many shamans, druids,and others who worship this strange being often seek out this lotus. A save vs. poison or become addicted to the lotus of the monster god Sfanomoe.


Many strange treasures and weird artifacts are often interned with those who have been addicted to the various lotus. Their minds are consumed with matters of the occult as such visions poison their very being and they seek out weird & rude treasures of the Great Old Ones. Here are 1d6 such treasures & artifacts of the ancient addicts. Beware the fronds of the lotus adventurers or you may join the bones of those who have come before.

1d6 Random Treasures &
Finds Of The Ancient Lotus Table 

1. A set of golden instruments used in the preparation of the the lotus powder worth 10000 gold pieces delicately craved from ivory, gold, and precious gems. 
2. Beautifully carved knives of deep glass metal used to trim the buds of the lotus worth 7000 gold pieces and are +2 because of the demonic enchantments on them. 
3. Nine forks of silver and gold that swim with the visions of the lotus. Druids and shamans must save vs poison handling these treasures or they will slip into visions of the lotus 
4. A miniature brazer used to prepare the lotus enchanted with a fire elemental with Hyperborean command words carved into the bowl of the thing. It can create a 'flame strike' three times per day with a range of thirty feet. If any lotus is burned in the thing it will give visions and prophecies to the owner. Worth 30,000 gold pieces
5. Twelve golden pipes carved from the bones of ancient Hyperborean priests worth about 7,000 gold pieces gilded with the wisdom of the ancients. When smoked with lotus powder these pipes act as a 'contact other plane' spell once per day. They are worth 20,000  to the cult of the monster god Sfanomoe. 
6. 22 delicate carved cards made from the ivory & bones of the beasts of the .
   the monster god Sfanomoe. They are used to chop up the lotus powder and then used as a deck of prophecy cards. Once per day they will divine one future event for a user. They are worth 30000 gold pieces to an alien cult of semi demonic beings who worship the monster god Sfanomoe. They have been lost for centuries after the murder of the grand lama of this cult.
   
   I fain would love thee, but thy lips are fed
   With poison-honey, hivéd in a skull;
   They seem like scarlet poppies, beautiful
   For delving roots, deep-clenchèd in the dead.
   
   Thine eyes are coloured like the nightshade-flow'r.***
   Blent in the opiate perfume of thy breath
   Are dreams, and purple sleep, and scented death
   For him that is thy lover for an hour.
   
   Mandragora, within the graveyard grown,
   Hath given thee its carnal root to eat,
   And vipers, born and nurstled in a tomb,
   
   From fawning mouths drip venom at thy feet;
   Yet from thy lethal lips and thine alone,
   Love would I drink, as dew from poison-bloom.
   Love Malevolent  (1922)  by Clark Ashton Smith

'Old Venus' Campaign Setting Redux & Upgrade For A Sunday

So I've been rereading a lot of classic pulp novels & semi Appendix N material, this includes a good dose of Edgar Rice Burroughs but not the usual Tarzan & Barsoom novels. I'm going for some of the really obscure stuff that over the years various "fans" & gamers have dismissed. I'm talking about one of ERB's last book series The Venus or Atmor novels. The Atmor series  isn't in the public domain in the United States but its readily available through any number of used book stores.

• Pirates of Venus (1934)
• Lost on Venus (1935)
• Carson of Venus (1939)
• Escape on Venus (1946)
• The Wizard of Venus (1964)
  

The first novel the Pirates of Venus contains most of the action taking place in giant trees very reminiscent of Endor from The Return of the Jedi film. I've often wondered if ERB's Pirates of Venus might have been part of the inspiration for villages of the Ewoks. The enemies are Venusian communists who are some of the more stupid & insipid enemies found in ERB's works Wiki has a pretty good break down of what I'm talking about;
"The novel contains elements of political satire aimed at communism. The novel's villains, the Thorists, start a revolution in the nation of Vepaja for their own good only, cheating the uneducated masses and killing or driving away those doctors and other highly educated that form the foundation of the society. Throughout the book the Thorists remain distant and unreal, and those few that the hero Carson Napier meets are often stupid or incompetent. The Kalkars, villains of Burroughs' other novel The Moon Maid, were also modeled on the Russian Communists.)"
So why are the ERB Venus novels important to an old school D&D or AD&D dungeon master? Because they give context to the 'Old Venus' setting. When you begin to look at the latter three novels in the Atmor series there's a deep & abiding dungeonsque ecology happening on the planet. We get this especially with Escape on Venus when the hero confronts a society of Deep One hybrids who embrace many of the conventions of Venusian life.


This boiling stew pot of ecological cycles of life & death are dependent upon the Great Old One of Clark Ashton Smith's The Immeasurable Horror & A Voyage to Sfanomoë. 

There are one or more plant themed Great Old Ones who preserve life on Venus & then go on to continue the cycles of life & death every couple of thousand years. This cycle falls right in line with the Henry Kuttner/ C.L. Moore Clash By Night & its sequel Fury.

All of this lines up quite nicely with C.L. Moore's North West Smith novels & Leigh Brackett's The Enchantress of Venus. Leigh Brackett's Venus is a world where man is the late comer & exploiter. There are lots of ancient ruins, countless dungeons, etc. because all of the mysteries of Venus have been explored or have they?


Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition now offers many monsters & resources that make the 'Old Venus' setting far easier to flesh out. So let me put this who affair into the context of my 'Old Earth' campaign setting. The two Venusian Great Old Ones were asleep at the very beginning of the Hyperborean wars. Soon however they exploded across the surface and the terraforming began. Ancient ruins not seen for 20000 years came to life with frightening vigor & the world became a seething hothouse of horror and weirdness. Today there are a few scattered barbarian colonist tribes trying to scratch out an existence. This is a prehistoric alien world of incredible danger and riches whose products can make or break a trade house with ease. I'm going to flesh this out as time permits but that these days is at a premium.

All of the stories & novels discussed in this blog post are being used for violation of the  trade marks & copy rights of their respective holders. None of the rpg game systems discussed are in anyway responsible for the content of this blog. This blog post is for educational & entertainment purposes only and the contents are the copyright of the author.

1d6 Random Treasures & Finds Of The Ancient Lotus Table For Your Old School Campaigns

Deep in the heart of certain Hyperborean ruins are ancient spirits of malevolent intent and dangerous aspect. These horrors are created from those who sucked down the fumes of the black lotus that grew from the corpse farms of Atlantis. These spirits are part of the family of specters created not through violence but the corpse born curse of the Black Lotus corpse flowers. They have energy drain abilities of their ilk because of the dreaded flower's connections with the Black Gulf.



These horrid spirits are addicted to the life forces of humans crave it as gives them a temporary sense of life and reality. These spirits have the appearance of addicts of the most morbid types but their eyes have been replaced by black purple orbs of the void. Their eyes tear with  a tarry black ectoplasm that causes fear & panic for anyone coming within thirty feet of its unnaturalness. Animals will not tolerate its presence at all & kill themselves to flee from it. It is is said that black lotus addiction caused the decline of the Hyperboreans and this often leads to the corpses of black lotus fiends being found with valuables. Black lotus vines are found entwined among the corpse's remains.


Upon 'Old Venus' deep within the swamp lands of the lower valleys there are the 'Spotted Purple Lotus' which grow entwined around the bones of old Hyperborean colonists. This plant only blooms when the star Aldebaran is in the house of 'El' in the Venusian sky. It is found wild among the oldest ruins &  cultivated by the dread lizardmen of Venus. They raise it using corpses of certain potent Venusian chieftains & wizards who consider it an honor to be placed among the fronds of the plants. These corpses become entwined in a mass of the plant until they become guardian monsters animated by the inherit magick of the corpses. 'Spotted Purple Lotus' powder  is worth over 6000 gold pieces per drought. It allows a wizard, druid, or even a necromancer to communicate with the Great Old One known as Sfanomoe. The monster god will grant 1d6 spells to the user but the user must make a 'Charisma' roll to gain such eldritch alien knowledge. Lotus women of Venus often hunt those who have consumed the spotted purple blossom. These horrors can smell its users up to 200 feet away and go into a blood frenzy around the pollen
Because of its strange alien connection to the monster god Sfanomoe 'spotted purple lotus' can cure any poison or radiation damage. But the user or recipient will have 1d10 strange visions as the powder courses through their brain. Many shamans, druids,and others who worship this strange being often seek out this lotus. A save vs. poison or become addicted to the lotus of the monster god Sfanomoe.


Many strange treasures and weird artifacts are often interned with those who have been addicted to the various lotus. Their minds are consumed with matters of the occult as such visions poison their very being and they seek out weird & rude treasures of the Great Old Ones. Here are 1d6 such treasures & artifacts of the ancient addicts. Beware the fronds of the lotus adventurers or you may join the bones of those who have come before.

1d6 Random Treasures &
Finds Of The Ancient Lotus Table 

1. A set of golden instruments used in the preparation of the the lotus powder worth 10000 gold pieces delicately craved from ivory, gold, and precious gems. 
2. Beautifully carved knives of deep glass metal used to trim the buds of the lotus worth 7000 gold pieces and are +2 because of the demonic enchantments on them. 
3. Nine forks of silver and gold that swim with the visions of the lotus. Druids and shamans must save vs poison handling these treasures or they will slip into visions of the lotus 
4. A miniature brazer used to prepare the lotus enchanted with a fire elemental with Hyperborean command words carved into the bowl of the thing. It can create a 'flame strike' three times per day with a range of thirty feet. If any lotus is burned in the thing it will give visions and prophecies to the owner. Worth 30,000 gold pieces
5. Twelve golden pipes carved from the bones of ancient Hyperborean priests worth about 7,000 gold pieces gilded with the wisdom of the ancients. When smoked with lotus powder these pipes act as a 'contact other plane' spell once per day. They are worth 20,000  to the cult of the monster god Sfanomoe. 
6. 22 delicate carved cards made from the ivory & bones of the beasts of the .
   the monster god Sfanomoe. They are used to chop up the lotus powder and then used as a deck of prophecy cards. Once per day they will divine one future event for a user. They are worth 30000 gold pieces to an alien cult of semi demonic beings who worship the monster god Sfanomoe. They have been lost for centuries after the murder of the grand lama of this cult.
   
   I fain would love thee, but thy lips are fed
   With poison-honey, hivéd in a skull;
   They seem like scarlet poppies, beautiful
   For delving roots, deep-clenchèd in the dead.
   
   Thine eyes are coloured like the nightshade-flow'r.***
   Blent in the opiate perfume of thy breath
   Are dreams, and purple sleep, and scented death
   For him that is thy lover for an hour.
   
   Mandragora, within the graveyard grown,
   Hath given thee its carnal root to eat,
   And vipers, born and nurstled in a tomb,
   
   From fawning mouths drip venom at thy feet;
   Yet from thy lethal lips and thine alone,
   Love would I drink, as dew from poison-bloom.
   Love Malevolent  (1922)  by Clark Ashton Smith
   
   
    
   

Getting A More Lovecraftian Campaign Spin On Leigh Brackett's 'The Citadel of Lost Ships' & The Old Solar System Setting &

So last night with headache on the boil, I closed down the internet & began to really think about some of the background of my fall AS&SH campaign. Part of this was to return to Leigh Brackett's The Citadel of Lost Ships. " Brackett's novelette "Citadel of Lost Ships" was the cover story in the March 1943 issue of Planet Stories"
'The Kraylens are a dying tribe, a scrap of old Venus, but Campbell is determined to help those that had helped him!'

The novella has a sense of the incredibly desperate  as the humans of Leigh Brackett's solar system are incredibly desperate & are more then willing to not only exploit the native races of her solar system but cause them to go extinct in spectacular fashion.

You can download
& read The Citadel of Lost Ships Right Over Here

The novella is a mirror darkly for the Old West & the plight of the American Indian. Leigh Brackett wrote many Westerns in her time & was a pulp powerhouse writer. But I really started thinking about the secure place humanity would have among the solar system. What would happen if the 'older races' came from beyond the stars to reclaim their old home worlds. I've written about Adapting Leigh Brackett's 'The Citadel Of Lost Ships' Novella To The 'Old Venus' Campaign Setting 

This is going to be a bit different because we're going to do a bit of exploiting and adapting of the future of the novella. I've said before reading this novel I kept expecting a shoggoth or two to show up whist I was reading this novel.  So if we start gazing at this novella through a Dungeons & Dragons lens then things start to get very interesting.
Looking deeper into the history of the Venusians there isn't simply one or two tribes of humanoids on Venus there are lots. If we take a stare  into the fetid swamp like world of Venus then we get a look into a world of lizard men tribes, fish men with gills, a world of dinosaurs or dinosaur like life forms,  & one very scared Terra Venusian Coalition government. Why are they so ready to off every last native Venus they can?
Because they'd stumbled upon the hidden Great Race of Yith city archives high in the mountains of the poles of Venus.

[T]he Great Race ... waxed well-nigh omniscient, and turned to the task of setting up exchanges with the minds of other planets, and of exploring their pasts and futures. It sought likewise to fathom the past years and origin of that black, aeon-dead orb in far space whence its own mental heritage had come – for the mind of the Great Race was older than its bodily form. . . The beings of a dying elder world, wise with the ultimate secrets, had looked ahead for a new world and species wherein they might have long life; and had sent their minds en masse into that future race best adapted to house them – the cone-shaped beings that peopled our earth a billion years ago.

— H. P. Lovecraft, "The Shadow Out of Time"

 Earth wasn't the only place that the Great Race had its nippers into & Venusians had been teaching magic to humanity since the last cycle of the sinking of Atlantis. What is exactly has the Great Race fired up & heading out into its mass mind push at the end of the Shadow Out of Time?
"He discovers that the Yithians on Earth died out eons ago, their civilization destroyed by a rival, utterly alien pre-human race described as "half-polypous" creatures, but the Yithian minds will inhabit new bodies on Earth after humanity is long gone. His tenuously held sanity is challenged when he discovers the proof he seeks—and that not only do remains of the Yithians' past civilization still exist on earth, but also still remaining are those who destroyed them. It is also mentioned that the current appearance of the Yithians is not the original, but one acquired during a previous mass-projection of the minds of their race when disaster beckoned, leaving the original inhabitants to die in the bodies of the Yithians."
So what does this have to do with Brackett's novelette "Citadel of Lost Ships" ? Everything really because one of the 'doomed' Venusian chieftains let's slip some of the coming doom. Men had found resources that had previously used by other older races.

At some far distant point in the future of Old Earth the Hyperboreans returned according to Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborea cycle & his Zothique cycles.

Venus fate in the far future is to be terraformed by a planet wide planet ecological life form that we get a solid look at in The Immeasurable Horror by Clark Ashton Smith. 

This is one of the secrets that the  Terra Venusian Coalition government knows about but there are others.

So surely there's no D&D connection with all of this? Actually there is in spades. The far future of this Venus is going to be a teeming world of incredibly dangerous life forms & various tribes of humanoids including various lizardmen, & Atlan Venusians and large swaths of Deep Ones who are devoted to Olhydra Princess of Evil Water Creatures. Babblers haunt the swamp lands & kelpie queens the shallow seas. X6 Quagmire is perfect  some deep swamp land encounters from the Serpent Peninsula for just this sort of a world and its for the  AD&D 1st edition game. X6 would require a bit of adaptation but could work quite nicely to get the feel and weirdness of the setting.


So what sorts of encounters would we expect in this far future  style of 'Old Venus'? I've worked up a few for you to add into your own home games. But don't be afraid to add in more alien elements to this sort of a campaign. We'll get into some of the weirder inhabitants in tomorrow's blog entry.

1d6 Venus Sinister Swamp Encounters Table

1. 1d6 Aquatic swamp ghouls hunting among the shoals and swamp trees; the swamp water perfectly camouflages this hunting pack of undead fiends who prowls along the bottom edges of the water ready to pull down prey and drown them. They attack in pairs of two sometimes waiting for prey to have a moment alone. 
2. A mated pair of bone snappers who are searching for suitable prey for their young in a nearby nest. They use pack tactics and flanking to get the drop on their prey. They work quickly and viciously to break limbs and finish off resistance as quickly as possible . 
3. Three hunting canoes belonging to a war party of pig faced swamp orcs searching for easy prey for their nearby village. They are armed with short bows, poisoned darts, blow guns, and wooden shields in addition to iron wood short swords. There are 1d4 of the mad bastards hopped up on war fungus drugs. 
4. 1d6 giant swamp leeches moving through the water attracted by the movement from a nearby hollow lair. These horrors are twice the normal hit points and very hungry. 
5. Swamp underwater trolls with a nearby lair filled with the remains of three travelers and a small cache of 3000 gold coins worth of gems. They are vicious and very violent monsters who have a fresh hunger for travelers. 
6. Swamp dwelling Eye of The Deep, who is served by three Deep One henchmen armed with poison darts and blow guns. They take sacrifices for their master who in turn worships and serves Cthulhu in the form of a black idol in the middle of a far off corner of the swamp land. There is 30,000 gold piece sacrifice pile of loot that has poisonous swamp serpents that dwell on it.

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. None of the ideas or opinions expressed 
in this post are meant to violate the trademarks nor copy rights of any 
of the table top rpgs discussed nor are they in away responsible for the
 thoughts or opinions of the author. 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.

New Forbidden Magic Spell For Your Old School Campaigns - Summon Scrag Horde

'Why are we running?' Rel The Strong' the red Martian mercenary was running through the mud of 'Old Venus'.
'Because I relieved the legion of an object that didn't belong to them'
Vro Tholian occultist was flying through the swamp with little ceremony.
'Is it valuable?' Rel's voice was flaccid at best & panicked at worst. 
'Yes'
'Then what are we going to do?' Rel was almost but not quite out of ammo for his neutron blaster
'I have an idea!' Vro Tholian occultist was already intoning something high and horrible sounding things that might be alien words under his throat as the search lights stabbed through the tall alien trees. That's when the first of the Scrags burst from under the water.
Rel grabbed Vro Tholian occultist & hid behind one of larger alien trees just as another underwater troll bust from its home and took down one of the legion soldiers on the two scoundrels trail. There were shouts of panic as the rest of the horrors burst from under the water.

Summon Scrag Horde
Level:3
Range: 30 feet +20 per level of caster
Duration: 1d4 + 3 hours per level of the caster
This spell reaches deep into the lowest levels of the supernatural & summons up the ancient alien ties of the troll kind. This variation of the alien bargain summons the aquatic parasites that once served ancient Deep One kings & the troll kind are bound to serve the caster. This was once a forbidden war spell of the Deep Ones.
The Scrags will attack the enemies of the caster but this spell hits the centers of violence of the monster's brain. Casters often have to hide as the blood lust of the Scrags take out both caster and target. This spell often attracts 1d8 additional Scrag because of its magick power & energies.

Super Scienctists, Sorcerers, & Synthetics - The Curious & Winding History Of The Android on 'Old Mars' & 'Old Venus'

Androids as we know them came about as early as Nineteen Twenty from Czech writer Karel Čapek's play R.U.R. which stands for Rossumovi Univerzální Roboti (Rossum’s Universal Robots);"The play begins in a factory that makes artificial people, called roboti (robots), from synthetic organic matter. They are not exactly robots by the current definition of the term; they are living flesh and blood creatures rather than machinery and are closer to the modern idea of clones, they may be mistaken for humans and can think for themselves. They seem happy to work for humans at first but a robot rebellion leads to the extinction of the human race. Čapek later took a different approach to the same theme in War with the Newts, in which non-humans become a servant class in human society"
These are quite literally vat grown androids but R.U.R was hugely influential in Science Romance circles. And yes Mary Shelly's Frankenstein was the catyslist for all of the automatons to follow including R.U.R. but what does all of this have to do with 'Old Mars' & 'Old Venus'? As we shall see everything. In Clark Aston Smith's Zothique, Hyperborea, and Atlantis cycles respectively there is evidence of his wizards & sorcerers dipping their quills into the vat bred automaton issue. So much so that the Golems of Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea are called automatons. In Warriors of The Red Planet that we get a PC race that are vat grown androids as a viable option for play.

But its once again Edgar Rice Burroughs who puts these flesh & blood creations in the lime light with his Einstein of Martian medicine Ras_Thavas. From organ transplants to full body conversion this gentlemen does it all in the mad scientist gig. He takes on Ulysses Paxton, as his apprentice because of his distrust of fellow Barsoomians.



You can download & read The Master Mind of Mars here.  from Amazing Stories Annual v01n01 (1927) (d Vaughn), this one is one of my favorite versions. Ras Thavas later on reforms and then pops up in the Synthetic Men of Mars when John Carter needs his help after his wife is gravely injured.  
Its really here that we see the true scope of the android or hormad races on 'Old Mars'.
" Synthetic Men of Mars (1939), by which time he has transferred his base to the dead city of Morbus in the Toonolian Marshes. There he has been experimenting in growing monstrous synthetic human beings called hormads. The most intelligent of these turn on him and force him to grow an army of hormads with which to conquer Barsoom. They also force their captive to transplant their brains into the bodies of imprisoned normal Martians. Ras's chance to turn the tables comes when the earthman John Carter, Warlord of Mars and prince of Helium, seeks his surgical aid for his wife Dejah Thoris, injured in an accident. Imprisoned with Ras, Carter and his companion Vor Daj plot with him against the hormads. Vor Daj is given the body of a hormad to spy on their captors; meanwhile, Carter and Ras escape, returning with a great fleet of airships from Helium. Vor Daj is recovered and Morbus, which has been overrun by a huge mass of cancerously growing hormad flesh, is destroyed with incendiary bombs. Ras then restores Vor Daj to his original body.

One hormad, Ras's pupil Pew Mogel, is later revealed in "John Carter and the Giant of Mars" (1940) to have escaped from Morbus and established a new base in the dead city of Korvas, from which he continues to plot world conquest using the scientific skills he gleaned from his mentor. His scheme is defeated by John Carter."
So there's a good chance that if your playing an android on Mars their an escaped homad, no wonder they might be screwed up. They've been hunted at every turn, and nearly killed by their own creator. But all of this goes back to an earlier work of ERB's called The Monster Men. "Cornell University professor Arthur Maxon, who has been experimenting in the creation of artificial life, travels with his daughter Virginia to one of the remote Pamarung Islands in the East Indies to pursue his project." One of his creations gets a hold of Virginia & runs amuck but how exactly did professor Arthur Maxon get a hold of either Ras_Thavas research or Rossum’s Universal Robots's materials for his experiments? In an interesting side note American naval vessel arrives; it turns out to be seeking von Horn a minor character & a deserter, to arrest him. An American navel vessel to arrest one deserter? No, I don't think so. Despite the 'happy ending' of the Monster Men I think your looking at two homad style androids Virginia & the protagonist Townsend J. Harper, Jr. whom are both prototype androids created by the good doctor whist he was in the employ of the US Navy. Barsoom has been in communication with Earth for decades using the Barsoomian version of Gridley wave FTL devices. Its a very simple matter to connect the plot points between ERB's various creations.

Dust-jacket illustration of The Monster Men
by J. Allen St. John

When we get into Leigh Brackett's Old Solar System then things get really interesting, I mentioned Ras_Thavas's brain transfers? Well in 1946 Brackett wrote; "Lorelei of the Red Mist, in which the protagonist is a thief called Hugh Starke. Brackett finished the first half before turning it over to Ray Bradbury, so that she could leave to work on The Big Sleep." Hugh Starke has his brain transferred into the body of a warrior called Conan to be used as the cat's paw for a blue breasted sorceress. Yeah, that didn't work out the way she was expecting it. The interesting sword & sorcery bits are the giant Himalayan like mountains in the story, the super science aspects, & the hints of deeper android style technology laying just out of sight of the protagonist.  The novella is still very popular and remains one of the mainstays of Brackett's work. But there's a lot of OSR ground to cover here, for one thing the androids of WoRP are perfect additions as owners of lost kingdoms, guarders of hordes, & guardians of forbidden knowledge. This means that for Adventurer, Conqueror, King they're a nice addition to the roaster possible planetary NPC dangers & they make excellent opponents. 


But there's more here then simply guardians of forbidden secrets angle. Dealing with vat grown or even mechanical monster PC's are not the only player options. There are lots of angles that can be used. One of the other odd little corners of the cybernetic that came out in 1931 is the Jameson Satellite series about a human Professor Jameson whose body is cryopreserved & resurrected by the Zoromes  benevolent full conversion cybernetic aliens. So why mention this series? Because these entities are truly alien & yet fully capable of having all kinds of adventures across the cosmos. These are the type of alien being who would confront the horrors of the Mythos head on. These are not Mythos related stories but they are some old favorites of mine.
You can download the "The Jameson Satellite' here

But what about using androids and sythetics within OSR games is there a readily available PC class that can be used in other OSR games such as OSRIC or Advanced Labyrinth Lord? Well actually yes there is! PC6 - The OSR Android From  Jeremy Reaban

is perfect for adding an android PC class to your old school games, its designed with other retroclone D&D  versions: original edition, basic and expert edition, and the cyclopedia edition. Its pay what you want and its perfect for adding in a bit of that old ultra cybernetic to your old school games!

But where are the vat grown Andies originate? There are two very Lovecraftian possibilities, one is the Great Race of Yith whose hi jinks with time & space might have them building androids as time probes. The second Lovecrafian race is the Elder Things, think about it. If they can create shoggoths & other bio organic organisms this might be the origin point for all of the vat grown android technology we've discussed so far.

"Formless protoplasm able to mock and reflect all forms and organs and processes - viscous agglutinations of bubbling cells - rubbery fifteen-foot spheroids infinitely plastic and ductile - slaves of suggestion, builders of cities - more and more sullen, more and more intelligent, more and more amphibious, more and more imitative! Great God! What madness made even those blasphemous Old Ones willing to use and carve such things?"

-H.P. Lovecraft, "At the Mountains of Madness"

So once again this begs the question, are there hidden caches of lost Lovecraftian technology just waiting for PC's in the high mountains of  Old Mars & Venus? I think so & now suddenly the Star Trek Episode, What Little Girls Are Made of makes a bit more sense. There are reasons for this; "Given that the episode in which they appeared was written by horror author Robert Bloch, a fan of horror author H. P. Lovecraft (and wrote frequently for the Cthulhu Mythos), the Old Ones here were based on the Old Ones of Lovecraft's writings. (The Star Trek Compendium, 4th ed., pp. 40-41) Bloch also wrote "Catspaw", which makes reference to another "Old Ones"."  So there could be a number of androids running around your Star Ships & Space Men Second edition games with some very Lovecraftian origin points.


But who are these 'Old Ones'? Well I think that the Great Race of Yith is a good contender for these folks.
Could androids be found in other venues such as Hyperborea or even Earth? The quick & easy answer is yes. Given the isolated communities, the lone adventurers, & wizard's passion for relic technology. Such a relic as an independent technician android would be invaluable. The Logan's Run television show's Rem was a good example of this sort of an NPC.

Playing an android can be one of the most rewarding but challenging things that a player can do. But there is far more to the synthetics of classic science fantasy then many players realize & that's your in dungeon masters! Happy Rpging! More to come!

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. None of the ideas or opinions expressed 
in this post are meant to violate the trademarks nor copy rights of any 
of the table top rpgs discussed nor are they in away responsible for the
 thoughts or opinions of the author. 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. 

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

Continuing down the long winding jungle road of 'Old Venus' is Leigh Brackett's 'The Citadel Of Lost Ships'  which is set squarely in the Colonial era of the Brackett solar system. This is a more settled era of 'Old Venus' or so it would seem.
"The Kraylens are a dying tribe, a scrap of old Venus, but Campbell is determined to help those that had helped him!


"Roy Campbell woke painfully. His body made a blind, instinctive lunge for the control panel, and it was only when his hands struck the smooth, hard mud of the wall that he realized he wasn't in his ship any longer, and that the Guard wasn't chasing him, their guns hammering death.

He leaned against the wall, the perspiration thick on his heavy chest, his eyes wide and remembering. He could feel again, as though the running fight were still happening, the bucking of his sleek ship beneath the calm control of his hands. He could remember the pencil rays lashing through the night, searching for him, seeking his life. He could recall the tiny prayer that lingered in his memory, as he fought so skillfully, so dangerously, to evade the relentless pursuer.

Then there was a hazy period, when a blasting cannon had twisted his ship like a wind-tossed leaf, and his head had smashed cruelly against the control panel. And then the slinking minutes when he had raced for safety—and then the sodden hours when sleep was the only thing in the Universe that he craved.

He sank back on the hide-frame cot with something between a laugh and a curse. He was sweating, and his wiry body twitched. He found a cigarette, lit it on the second try, and sat still, listening to his heartbeats slow down.

He began to wonder, then, what had wakened him.

It was night, the deep indigo night of Venus. Beyond the open hut door, Campbell could see the liha-trees swaying a little in the hot, slow breeze. It seemed as though the whole night swayed, like a dark blue veil.

For a long time he didn't hear anything but the far-off screaming of some swamp beast on the kill. Then, sharp and cruel against the blue silence, a drum began to beat.

It made Campbell's heart jerk. The sound wasn't loud, but it had a tight, hard quality of savagery, something as primal as the swamp and as alien, no matter how long a man lived with it.

The drumming stopped. The second, perhaps the third, ritual prelude. The first must have wakened him. Campbell stared with narrow dark eyes at the doorway.

He'd been with the Kraylens only two days this time, and he'd slept most of that. Now he realized that in spite of his exhaustion, he had sensed something wrong in the village."
Bracket's Venus is an artificial world built as a hot house laboratory eons ago by the Elder Things. All of the signs are there from mutant prehistoric life forms, to artificially adapted people, etc. I kept waiting for the shoggoths to show up at any minute. Roy Campbell is the type of folk hero the solar system needs & wants. These are the Venusians adapted to live in the swamps of Venus, a proud people with +2 to charisma, constitution, & able to breath underwater. They have many of the qualities of the peoples of Atlantis without the taint of the Deep Ones. But this is an era of their backs up against the wall of the Terra Venusian Coalition government who are going to force these peoples into pure extinction. These are the ancient enemies of the Nahai. 



The real star of this novella is Romany an artificial station in orbit around Venus, this is the venue of lost, desperate, and trodden upon by so called progress of Brackett's & C.L. Moore's solar system. This is also the perfect venue to use the Mentalist rules of Warriors of the Red Planet. Where is an older Northwest Smith making stops and running cargo? Romany is probably one of those venues. And is the villain here really the Terra Venusian Coalition government? Or are they the victim of far more sinister & deadly threats from beyond the solar system ridge? Here's the problem with melting pot venues like 'Old Venus' in the colonial era, its the perfect place for agents of far more powerful alien god things to move through. Romany on the other hand is the breeding ground for space pirates, adventurers, and outlaws. Desperate people do desperate things & thieves guilds are mobile.


What does this mean? Well, essentially the ideas and concepts discussed in Adventurer, Conqueror, King can be applied to other venues as well as stationary adventure & setting locations. We see this throughout the 'The Citadel of Lost Ships'. This is also something we see in the Warriors of the Red Planet rpg system.

But what the hell has the Terra Venusian Coalition government so scared? We'll get into that tomorrow. There's a very interesting take on social class & character venue throughout the Citadel of Lost Ships. This is something similar that we see with adventurers in Dark Albion where the social status allows both movement and restriction with certain social circles. This wasn't done by accident by Leigh Brackett. She was a genius when it came to presenting her character's within the confines and movements of their setting something we'd see a lot of in her later screen writing and television script work.
Romany is just the sort of a station made from old space craft that you'd see near Hyperborea and other lands beyond the Boreas Winds. The kind of weird dungeons that wizards dream of.
This location offers a possible idea for a latter day space dungeon for PC's.
The Citadel of Lost Ships is one of my all time favorites.

You can download and read The Citadel of Lost Ships Right Over Here

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. None of the ideas or opinions expressed 
in this post are meant to violate the trademarks nor copy rights of any 
of the table top rpgs discussed nor are they in away responsible for the
 thoughts or opinions of the author. 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.