Holloween OSR Adventure - H.P. Lovecraft's The Case of Charles Dexter Ward & Free Lovecraft Download

"The essential Saltes of Animals may be so prepared and preserved, that an ingenious Man may have the whole Ark of Noah in his own Studie, and raise the fine Shape of an Animal out of its Ashes at his Pleasure; and by the lyke Method from the essential Saltes of humane Dust, a Philosopher may, without any criminal Necromancy, call up the Shape of any dead Ancestour from the Dust whereinto his Bodie has been incinerated."

Already I'm trying together together my players for a Halloween game & the scheduling hasn't exactly been easy. Halloween is beyond a busy time here in New England but I just realized that I don't actually have an adventure written?! What I do have is the germ of an idea & it involves H.P. Lovecraft's novella The Case of Charles Dexter Ward. Now I'm about to take a leaf out of my friend Jeffrey Talanian's notebook. For various Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea's rpg adventures over the years Jeff has used the titles of Lovecraft stories then adapted the themes to his adventures. Instead what I want to do is adapt the whole cloth Lovecraft material to an adventure. Here's a quick run down of the Lovecraft novel's history from the wiki entry;"The Case of Charles Dexter Ward is a short horror novel (51,500 words) by American writer H. P. Lovecraft, written in early 1927, but not published during the author's lifetime. Set in Lovecraft's hometown of Providence, Rhode Island, it was first published (in abridged form) in the May and July issues of Weird Tales in 1941; the first complete publication was in Arkham House's Beyond the Wall of Sleep collection (1943). It is included in the Library of America volume of Lovecraft's work."

The first installment of The Case of Charles Dexter Ward
was promoted with an outsized banner headline on the cover of Weird Tales.

I'm not going to lie here the 1963 Roger Corman film The Haunted Palace is beyond a favorite of mine. As a kid I was absolutely obsessed with the Roger Corman Poe films.And for any Lovecraft fan this is a perfect film in many ways. For the old school & OSR fan its a sort of blue print but its not the only one. 

Just in case you haven't read through Lovecraft's novel here's a plot synoisis again from the wiki entry; "Charles Dexter Ward is a young man from a prominent Rhode Island family who has disappeared from a mental asylum. He had been incarcerated during a prolonged period of insanity, during which he exhibited minor and inexplicable physiological changes. His empty cell is found to be very dusty. The bulk of the story concerns the investigation conducted by the Wards' family doctor, Marinus Bicknell Willett, in an attempt to discover the reason for Ward's madness and physiological changes. Willett learns that Ward had spent the past several years attempting to discover the grave of his ill-reputed ancestor, Joseph Curwen.

The doctor slowly begins to reveal the truth behind the legends surrounding Curwen, an eighteenth-century shipping entrepreneur and alleged alchemist, who was in reality a necromancer and mass murderer. A raid on Curwen's farm was remarkable for the shouted incantations, lights, explosions, and some not-quite-human figures shot down by the raiders. The raiders swore any witnesses to strict secrecy about what they saw and heard." Curwen get's resurrected & Lovecraftian hilarity ensues in  Arkham Massachusetts. Now the one thing that I loved about the 'Haunted Palace' film  besides everything is the fact that the village itself was very isolated & otherworldly with the use of mists everywhere. The film reminded me of Tom Moldvey's X2 Castle Amber module. In fact I'd go so far as to say that X2 is a perfect blue print for how to pull off The Case of Charles Dexter Ward as a Halloween adventure.



In fact I'll go one better & say that Joseph Curwen could be a contemporary wizard to Stephen Amber. How?! Well these are high level wizards who transcend time & space, they regularly deal with & have rivalries with each other. There are several references throughout the story off of the fact that Joseph Curwan owns a copy of the Necronomicon & has had regular traffic with HP Lovecraft's Dreamlands. And he's perfected a body jumping form of 'serial immortality'. He might as well be an instructor in the colleges of Glantri. 

I can already see the wheels turning & why not just use Ravenloft from second edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons?! Curwen could be a Dark Lord & all of the trappings are there?! Which gets me back to something I noticed last night while rereading the Arduin rpg. The accessiblity of Curwen's Arkham. The village adventure location is small, essential to the Haunted Palace & it can be reached by anyone.


Now consider for a moment that the old school & the OSR has already proved me with everything I need to make this a reality. The Arkham of Joseph Curwen's era is right around the corner in Goblinoid games Realms of Crawling Chaos.  The evil of Joseph Curwen will arise again this Holloween my friends & rest assured the guests will be relieved of their essential salts!



The sorcerer is simply waiting for his next pumpkin spiced guests to arrive! More about this project as the month goes on!  


The Complete Works of H.P. Lovecraft
are available for Free Here. 

'Where The Bat Flies' A Weird Adventures Actual Play Event!

Tonight was a bit different, as I had a chance together together with Steve, his brother Mark, and their other brother in arms  Marcus. Marcus wished to return to the 'Weird Adventures.'  Noir sub-setting I did a few years ago called New Gomorrah. New Gomorrah's the kinda place that mom warned you about and the mob settled there via Interzone. It was also the place where Eric Anderson the son of the Bat had fled on a tramp steamer after murdering a thaumaturgist, his apprentice, and having stole several mystical relics from the mage in Staak. This wasn't the first time that the adventurers had been hired to trace down Anderson. Anderson was a completely amoral piece of work(adventurer, thief, & villain for hire) and unlike his dad was able to slip between the cracks in the planes. He took up the Bat mantle ten years ago and really went to town with the racket cutting a swath throughout the underworld of Staak. 

The rumor of course is that he's got his hands on a crystal skull among other wonderful little trinkets, he bribed the right people and slipped away to New Gomorrah. Now the adventurers were on his tale.

Eric Anderson aka The Bat
wanted for murder, robbery, and a host of other crimes

The adventurers were Elliot Nesmithian retired city detective whose worked for some of the best including Samael T. Hazard. Elliot was a wise cracking son of acre whose suit was cut to house a specially made  pair of pearl handled .45. He was retired army after the war and had served with 'The City' for twelve years before taking one in the leg. His partner was killed by the Bat in a botched jewelry store heist. Elliot has sworn vengeance. Steve's Fighter 5th level. 

Sin Fang 'The Sorceress Extraordinaire' - A lady adventuress of rare beauty and incredible talent. The Fangs are a Yian family renowned in magick for generations.Sin is considered 'odd' for turning her back on the family underworld business and becoming a magician of pretty high caliber. Sin had a radio program 'The Sorceress's Hour', that was until the Bat murdered her co host on live radio.Disgraced she swore vengeance and only last year came close to bringing Eric Anderson to justice. Since then she's taken on case after hard boiled case to track the son of a bitch down. Seventh  level wizard. Mark's PC 

Chattanooga Chad 'The Man With the Midas Touch' Chad was a locksmith before the War, in fact he was one of the very best, it didn't matter if it was mechanical, magical, or alchemical locks, traps, or mechanisms. The Chattanoogas were the very lock smiths and worked for various police departments, the Army, the Freedonian Rangers, until the faithful day when Eric Anderson murdered Chad's brother right in front of him in cold blood. The brothers were in the wrong place at the wrong time and between the Bat and a shipment of jewels. For ten years Chad has tracked the Bat across the planes and back to the City again.He's now a thief for hire on the side of right.  Mark's 5th level thief/adventurer. Amazing that three men can fall into each others company in a dry dusty bar out in the middle of a Freedonian border town. Now their on the trail of the Bat once again. And tonight they almost lost their lives!


In tonight's game they tracked the bastard to his hideout in a sub basement, instead they almost bought it as a Neo plastic blob  filled the place after one of the adventurers opened a closet and rolled a one. A dexterity check and suddenly one of the others grabbed him and pulled Chad away. His expensive shoe wasn't so lucky though. The menacing laughter filled the place and the bat flew the coop!

 New Gomorrah
New Gomorrah is the city at the center of the world, an alternative Eastern Sea board New York City filled with all of the elements of  the City and with the addition of masked vigilantes and adventurers. This is the quintessential  pulp city of so many dime novels. A place of high adventure, occult mystery, and strange mysteries and magic. Is it any wonder that the 'Bat' feels at home here? And its a place that comes into phase at night with both the City and the Beyond.


The city is host to its own brand of adventurers and heroes many times drifting in when the City's long shadows pull on the dimensional  fabric of  New Gomorrah allowing passage between the two worlds. Travel is infrequent, strange, and very dangerous and yet people do it as a matter of course.
More on New Gomorrah coming up soon.

Notes from Tonight's Game.
About ninety percent of tonight's adventure material came from Weird Adventure's author's blog From The Sorcerer's Skull Weird Adventures resource page over here. 

 Trey Causey makes some wonderful setting and gaming material be sure to check out his work with the Hydra Cooperative. 

Other items that appeared in tonight's game include items from the Smyth's & Jordon's Novelties Of Adventure catalog. These include Miracles of the Gnome Workshop Die Drop Table,  Wasteland Emporium & Wonderama Die Drop Table ,Magic Ring Die Drop Table & Potion Pill Die Drop Table