Reskinning DDA1 Arena of Thyatis By John Nephew For Old School 'Sorcery & Planetary' Campaigns.

"And simply everyone is going to the magnificent Villa Osteroplus, home of the wealthy old senator, Helenites. Raucous fun, exotic food, and even advanced betting on the upcoming Arena games are expected. Even adventurers just in from the outlands may meet the powerful here. So don your festive togas, for in Thyatis City there are important connections to be made and deeds to be done, duels to be fought and fame to be won."




'Welcome adventurers! You who are about to take your first steps on to the blood sands!  Adventurers! Do you want to become gladiators and fight in arena? You have no choice! We will teach you to fight, to bleed, & to entertain the crowd!'

I've stated it before if I was going to run a new 'Sorcery & Planet 'campaign coming up I'd do a gladiatorial combat themed one. And the perfect module doesn't exist to do such a campaign?!? Oh wait it does in the form of DDA1 Arena of Thyatis By John Nephew. So not only did I use this module with a Sword & Planet theme but I used it with a both a Mars & an old school Dark Sun module in the past. 
At present the fact that this module series can easily be reskinned hasn't been lost on me as a dungeon master. The Adventurer,Conqueror, King System's Barbarians of Kanahu is perfectly for all barbarian/gladiator  campaign.



Add in Carcosa & we've got the beginnings of a nasty little mutant gladiatorial campaign. In fact I printed out the arena from the Forgotten Realms wiki entry to great effect. 

In fact this goes back into the campaign harmony that I've done with Venger's Cha'alt by taking many of the adventure locations from Adventurer,Conqueoror, King's adventures & using them as stand in for Cha'alt's various locations. 

One of the aspects of this arena combat that's come up again & again has been the idea of various giant monsters vs mecha. This goes back into my memory of comic books of the late 70's that sported ads for the Shogun Warriors toy line. Check this ad out. 

And before I have all of the D&D diehards on my back I'd like to remind you that Hanna Barbera's Herculoids was doing this in Sixty Six before Dungeon & Dragon's was a thought in Arneson & Gygax's heads. The Herculoids AD&D files has it all for adding in many Hanna Barbera bits of alien goodness into your games! 

Let's say you want a completely  different OSR rpg system to handle all of the setting details?! The Castles & Crusades rpg could & will easily handle this campaign setting! The whole cloth details are already embedded in the Castle Keeper's Guide with blasters, space craft, etc. all there for the converting. 

So let's say that you've been using DDA1 Arena of Thyatis  & some of the gladiators have slipped their bonds or worse have been sold across planar borders into say into the Victorious rpg?! Could the heroes of a steampunk New York stand it to not slip their dimensional bonds & travel across the gates of reality to free an alien world from under thrall of such heinous villains?!

Could any right minded gadget loving hero resist the temptation of a mini humanoid Dragun armor which would be armor class 3, damage 1d8 per buzz saw swipe, 2d6 fire attack from mouth once per 2 rounds,  atomic power cell good for 100 years, +2 strength, & constitution. Special thanks Plaid Stallions 


But we all know that the hard core agents of Cha'alt: Fuchsia Malaise's city of A'agrybah are going to be scouting for local talent within the DDA1 Arena of Thyatis. So its only a matter of time before PC's might wind up within the grip of some gladiatorial traders! 

Memories & Commentary On The Classic Shogun Warriors Toy line & Seventies Marvel Comic Book For Your Old School Campaign

Its been a long while since the Shogun Warriors crossed my desk. But speaking with various friends over the weekend let me to redress some of the elements of the campaign elements of my Lamentations of the Flame Princess Carcosa/Marvel Super Heroes rpg game campaign. 
First a quick bit of background on the Marvel comics Seventies comic book series from the wiki entry;"The Shogun Warriors series (composed of 20 issues) was published from February 1979 to September 1980.^[2] In the comic book series, the Shogun Warriors were created by a mysterious group called the Followers of the Light^[3] and human operators were chosen from all around the world to operate the massive robots in order to battle evil."


Many of the resources for this campaign came straight from the Palaid Stallions website after asking those wonderful folks for permission to use some of their material for this blog. The toyline was incredible! They remain very high on the list of many toy collectors. 
 

In fact its the comic book series that really has the in for using the Shogun Warriors in an old school campaign;"The series took a dramatic turn with Shogun Warriors #16 (May 1980), as the Shogun Warriors' mentors were destroyed by the Primal One and his followers.^[8] This alien force decided that Earth's technology had outpaced its morality, making it their duty to destroy the Shogun Warriors as well as other powerful humans. Declining sales, as well as Moench's commitment to writing the Moon Knight comic book series that had just been started, led Marvel to cancel the Shogun Warriors comic book series" 

And here's where things get really interesting looking back over the Shogun Warriors comic series today it becomes apparent that Earth's Shoguns might not have been the only Warriors in existence. The Shogun Warriors have been hinted at being build on other planets & planes of existence by Followers of Light in their never ending struggle in the Chaos war. Godzilla & Rodan were hinted at existing right along side Red Ronin in the Seventies Marvel universe; "Between February 1979 and July 1979, Marvel had the comic book rights to both Godzilla and the Shogun Warriors. While the characters never crossed paths in their respective comics, Trimpe (who did the artwork for both series) drew a variation of Godzilla and Rodan alongside Daimos, Great Mazinger, Raydeen and Gaiking on the top page of a comic book advertisement soliciting the Shogun Warrior toys.^[5] Mattel simultaneously had a license to produce Shogun Warriors toys (at the time) and a license to produce toys based on Godzilla^[6] and Rodan.^[7] Though never appearing in the comic series, Red Ronin of Marvel's Godzilla, King of the Monsters comic book series was mentioned occasionally and was frequently written about in the letters pages. Shogun Warriors #15 (April 1980) was a fill-in written by Steven Grant with art by Mike Vosburg."

The alignments of Chaos,Law, & Neutrality on Carcosa & Cha'alt for that matter make it very possible for the Chaos War depicted being carried out by the 'Followers of Light' to continue on this Lovecraftian planet. Alien gladiatorial battles with Megabug Gladiators Mecha  are events that I eluded to taking place within this campaign. 

These battles could be taking place for the amusement of the royals of Venger Satanis's Torth who come to this campaign to observe the spectacle of semi religious gladiatorial mecha combat. 

In point of fact a quest for hidden giant mecha could well be the point of a weird old school campaign! Giant Tarrasque guardians protecting  the dungeon temples of the 'Followers of Light' where one or two of these semi sacred mecha are hidden  could be the focus of a campaign. Cha'alt is rife with giant dinosaurs & mutants the perfect fodder for Shogun Warrior battles. 

Artisan Guild Tarasque - Legendary Devourer miniature available here on Etsy. 

• Each 'Shogun Warrior' mecha has several weapon systems for your favorite OSR system. 
• These warrior units are powered by a drive system that enables the mecha to be active & in stasis for thousands or millions of years. 
• Some units can regenerate as trolls 
• Shogun warriors are often equipped with a unique weapon system similar to an artifact or other relic. 
• Many of the suggestions that various friends have proposed is that a version of the City of the Gods might exist on this Carcosa hybrid campaign. 

Dave Arneson (Author), David Richie (Author)'s DA3 setting might be the perfect location for this forbidden technology of the gods to exist.