Character Workshop & Loose On The Streets Of Olathoe Session Report

So last night I got together with friends to have a character workshop using Adventurer,Conqueror, King & Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition. Character workshops enable me to make sure the players are all on the same page with their PC's.



All of the players are extensively experienced Dungeons & Dragons players who have played a number of editions over their time in the hobby of table top gaming. So the ACKS Player's Companion From  Autarch  & the Guns of War supplement wasn't unfamiliar to them. PC's were set up rather quickly & equipment was bought. The PC's were off to the lands of Lomar amid the dire & dark streets of many-templed Olathoe.



Methought the world was bound with final frost:
The sun, made hueless as with fear and awe,
Illumined still the lands it could not thaw.
Then on my road, with instant evening crost,
Death stood, and in its dusky veils enwound,
Mine eyes forgot the light, until I came
Where poured the inseparate, unshadowed flame
Of phantom suns in self-irradiance drowned.

Death lay revealed in all its haggardness:
Immitigable wastes horizonless;
Profundities that held nor bar nor veil;
All hues wherewith the suns and worlds were dyed
In light invariable nullified;
All darkness rendered shelterless and pale.

White Death  (1912)  by Clark Ashton Smith

Many-templed Olathoe has returned along with the long mystery shrouded glens of the lands of  Lomar under the bloated sun of a far future world of 'Old Earth. The planet has moved on but the stars are not quite right for the Old Ones return. Mankind's city states  has uneasy truce with the Hyperboreans & subterranean empire of the realm of K'n-yan. For they ruled the Earth for a while but human kind proves to be far more resilient to these peoples then they thought. Mankind's works have been cast down but old ways of technology & super science persist in the human city states. Barbarianism is the rule & the sway of the sword along with magick sways the day.


Many-templed Olathoe is a city of 30,000 Hyperboreans at the height of their magical & occult technological progress. Mankind reached for the stars & fumbled whist he has the solar system along with some far flung colonies these are tedious holds at best. The coming of Hyperborea in the night sky & Saturn visible at night looming above the Earth has caused much destruction.


'Old Earth' is on the mend but there is a growing feeling that other more dangerous alien gods are returning as well. The land of Lomar is an agricultural & sea based society with human Viking second class citizens making up 20,000 mercenary troops, fishermen, tradesmen, & more. Olathoe uses fungal based food stuffs, geothermal power, & other high technological tactics to feed its citizens. In the shadow of  the mountains  Noton & Kadiphonek many temples dedicated to Tsathoggua, Nodens, & a host of other gods stand among the marbled streets.

""Lomar was home to the city of Olathoë, described in the story "Polaris"by HP Lovecraft:

Still and somnolent did it lie, on a strange plateau in a hollow between strange peaks. Of ghastly marble were its walls and its towers, its columns, domes, and pavements. In the marble streets were marble pillars, the upper parts of which were carven into the images of grave bearded men.^[9]

Later in the story the plateau is identified as Sarkis, and the mountains as Noton and Kadiphonek."

This is a world where the atomic rocket jockeys of the human city states bring cargo & much needed medicines from the human colonies. But also take the rare & exotic 'Old Earth' wares to the Outer Worlds, these delicate relationships are in peril with the awakening of the powers of far older & alien things then the Earth governments can imagine.


But right now Olathoë is greater danger from the tribes of inhuman raiders perched right outside their doors. The city has survived a raiding attack of incredible destruction as the PC's have just arrived.
The PC's are given a mission to carry a letter in code to the city watch by a mysterious set of travelers. A strange barbarian warrior accompanied them & seemed to guard the adventurers on this strange quest.
They were suddenly attacked by three gargoyles of leer continence & horrid violence. They managed to lay arrows into the monsters & destroy them but their barbarian chaperone was laid low by horrid wounds. The party's bard managed to heal the poor bastard & gained a reward in gold.

What happens next?! Tune in next week folks!

New OSR Spell - Summon Gremlins of Nightmare

Sleep is a pathless labyrinth,
Dark to the gaze of moons and suns,
Through which the exile clue of dreams,
A gossamer thread, obscurely runs.

The Maze of Sleep  (1912)
by Clark Ashton Smith

Summon Gremlins of Nightmare
Level: illusionist 2, wizard 3, witch 2, shaman 1 Range 120 feet, Duration 6 turns (1 hour)

The wizard, shaman, witch or illusionist reaches deep into the realms of dreams & phantasms opening a portal for the least demonic spirits of dreams. 1d12 of them will pour fourth temporarily into the waking world to cause havoc & chaos. They will have 1d3 temporary hit points & be able to attack a target that the caster designates for 1d4 points of damage. These creatures will pull hair, trip anyone they can, & cause as much havoc & mayhem that they can.
Shamans have a natural affinity for these spirits of spite & imagination, they often deal with them when bargaining for passage into the dream worlds to act as guides for the shaman. This spell causes these spirits to have passage and free reign in the waking world something relish to cause as much weirdness & chaos as possible.
There is a 30% chance of a PC tripping over an object or obstacle that has been left behind by the activities of these spirits. There is a 4% chance that a gremlin spirit may take special interest in one of the PC's and single them out for torment. Rumors of Hyperborean children using a variation  this spell to summon wicked play mates may only be nasty rumor. This spell is often used to summon distractions & nuances of the highest caliber. 


Brui Enru The Boy Wizard of Oralatha
who created The Summon Gremlins of Nightmare spell & was later consumed by a demon of Nightmare of the sixth circle.

There is a 70% chance that the entropic energies of the Gremlins of Nightmare will infect any complex machinery within the area of effect even after the gremlins disappear in puffs of doubt & reality. Further there is a 5% chance that a demon of nightmare from 'the Greater Depths of Nightmare' may come forth the portal that this spell creates. Such entities must be controlled or cowed into submission with Charisma & Wisdom contests with such entities. If ten or more Gremlins are present they may try to possess someone within the area of the spells effects.

OSR Commentary On The Orc Raids Of B11 King's Festival By Carl Sargeant For Your Old School Campaigns

"Someone has "borrowed" a cleric, and without him, the fabled King's Festival cannot go on. Unfortunately, it looks like the orcs have him, and your characters must rescue him. "

So I've been playing around with & looking over lots & lots of B/X  & Advanced  Dungeons & Dragons adventures over the last six to eight months. Now let's dive into the deeper B/X pool with an adventure that seldom gets mentioned.


If your looking for a B/X Dungeons & Dragons adventure that will actually take your PC's from first through fourth without the iconic drivel that seems to follow in the wake of Keep On The Borderlands. Let me point you all in the direction of one of the most under sung modules to come out post classic era TSR then B11 King's Festival might be just what your looking for. This introductory adventure will take your PC's from levels one right through four with action, danger, & plenty of actual plot.
This is an adventure that takes the humanoids & orcs especially bringing them where they belong front & center. So I know what your thinking, " What the hell does this have to do with Sword & Sorcery"? Well I'm glad you asked. The orcs of King's Festival are the nasty & highly dangerous pig faced orc bastards that old school players know & love.
But as good as my word B11 King's Festival makes a perfect Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition set up. The fact is that in AS&SH orcs are the product of a mating of Picts with a really nasty Lovecraftian or Clark Ashton Smith pig demon thing.


The result of this is a rather nasty monster with all of the charm of a migraine headache for your PC's. But there's also another hook here for AS&SH players for the DM to take full advantage of, "King's Festival provides players and DMs with a valuable introduction to fantasy role-playing in the land of Karameikos."

 If we transfer the events of King's Festival to just outside of the Hyperborean capital of Khromarium then suddenly things take a very weird turn of events. All of this might center on Petrides the evil NPC behind all of the events of this adventure. He could well be connected with the thieves/assassins guild  network of one of the Vorloi, Radu, and Torenescu families Atlantian royal survival families in Khormarium from my version of B6 The Veiled Society.

What King's Festival does doesn't just set up B6 but also puts orcs dangerously close to the Hyperborean capital & sets up events for either an earlier brush with Keep on the Borderland or a combat round about with Night's Dark Terror waiting in the wings. This all culminates in the awakening of the Lovecraftian forces of 'The Temple of Elemental Evil' set on Hyperborea.


I've written about The Temple of Elemental Evil way too many times on this blog. But there's a more subtle & insidious reason to pick B11 King's Festival as introductory adventure. B11 puts the PC's square on the path of domain level play, the PC's are in the cross hairs of the royals of the adventure & destined for greatness or the headman's ax. The stakes here are perfectly aligned for a Sword & Sorcery campaign set against the Adventurer, Conqueror, King rules set.



I've used B11 King's Festival in the past as a set up for a  Dark Avalon campaign. The 'orcs' were debased humans that had been mutated by the chaotic energies of Fairyland. There were  the ruins of Elven engines nearby allowing the animation of the dead. This all centered around the occult gateway that was beginning to open up again allowing a crossover into the dread realm. The set up here was the fact that the kidnapping by the 'orcs' was the first salvo of the Rose War.  The adventurers were pawns in the game of the royals. My point is that B11 King's Festival is flexible as it is useful.  If your going to set B11 for Dark Albion make sure that you use Cults of Chaos.

OSR Commentary - B/X Dungeons & Dragons Campaign Waltz & Science Fantasy Campaign Construction

Many folks look at B/X Dungeons & Dragons as a basic or beginning set for the grand game of table top role playing but I have found a bit more respect rummaging through the annals of this game. Lately I find myself referring constantly back to it mixing and matching B/X with Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition & Adventurer, Conqueror, King with bits of Labyrinth Lord. All of this becomes wrapped around a core of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition. The whole is not always the sum of its parts as the players & campaign dictate what comes to the fore for the system from session to session as all dungeon masters have to contend with.




So I've been thinking about my 'Old Earth''s Antarctica & day dreaming about HP Lovecraft's At The Mountains of Madness but after rereading the novella for the hundredth or three hundredth time I'm convinced that there were other entities besides the shoggoths. This is a teaming brand new frontier continient that is possibly one of the most alien & dangerous places on 'Old Earth'. A place teeming with jungles, deadly sub prehistoric monsters, shoggoths, The Elder Ones, raving Tcho-Tchoid mercenary bands,and scores of inhuman ruins, temples, and alien places whose form & function is unknown.


Here I turn back to Clark Ashton Smith & HP Lovecraft where shores of Antarctica is the domain of dangerous guardians. The Dean of Science fiction Jack Williamson early in his career laid down one of the weirder & very dangerous great Old Ones seldom mentioned The Ice Entity. First found in 1937's Thrilling Wonder Stories this god thing is a left over from the war between the Great Race & the Elder Things mentioned in HP Lovecraft's At The Mountains of Madness. This alien monster is both related to HP Lovecraft's The Colour Out of Space & Ithaqua.

The ice entity itself is worshiped by the Gnophkehs,  along with Rhan-Tegoth & Aphoom-Zhah. It keeps the new continent free from most humans & adventurers.The entity also has ties to the new North Pole of 'Old Earth' & forms a world spanning religious cult of great evil. It may its origin out around Neptune & Uranus where many Great Old Ones originated.
Jack Williamson during his early period was heavily influenced by Weird Tales style pulps & another favorite author of mine.
"Jack Williamson's work during this early period was heavily influenced by A. Merritt,^[4] author of The Metal Monster (1920) and other fantasy serials. Noting the Merritt influence, Algis Budrys described "The Metal Man" as "a story full of memorable images""

This same issue of 1937's Thrilling Wonder Stories also contains another great novella and possible creation of the Elder Things I'm speaking of the 'Brain of Venus'.  John Russell Fearn (1908–1960) isn't even known today outside of certain science fiction & pulp circles. He was one of the first British authors featured in American pulp magazines.
The Brain of Venus features what became 'the Venus Treatment' in my home AS&SH campaigns. 'The Venus treatment' is what happens when certain shoggoth & elder thing wizards & priests get a particularly strong individual's mind. They treat it with certain exotic necrotic alchemical formula preserving the thing & creating an undead guardian capable of the spells & abilities of a seventh level necromancer or evil wizard. These entities are free willed chaotically evil entities often carry out the wills of their alien masters. These things are often found in weird temples in strange basins of brine & soul literally rooted to the spot. They have an AC of 5  or more and can hurl a lightning bolt three times per day.
These 'Venus guardians' are often used to control 1d6 hosts of lesser entities around elder thing properties & holdings. These entities fight to the death with little to no regard for their own safety or well being. They are puppets acting out the wills of their twisted masters. The jungles of Anartica teem with creatures not seen for millions of years on Earth. There are darker & weirder entities that serve strange & sinister purposes. The Yzel tend the info temples & bio information storage houses of 'the Elder Ones'


They collect & collate much of the collected super science & higher alien intelligence of the Elder Ones. Speculation runs high among wizards of Old Earth that these entities are actually part of a telepathic alien higher mind system that has not been seen on Earth since the dawn of the planet. Many adventurer's brains have been turned to mush trying to 'hack' the library plant systems of the Elder Ones. Temples & buildings are covered with vast arrays of alien whorls, symbols, and etchings of the highest eldritch traditions. There are rumors of wizards sacrificing fortunes & wealth to study these forbidden places.
There is a 10% chance of a wizard going up a level or saving vs death as their body's are consumed in massive displays of other dimensional fires. Others are hunted down & gutted by shoggoths or worse during the night. The 'Elder Ones' keep their secrets well.


'Art Copyright 2017 Garrisonjames. Used by permission.' the 'Art Copyright 2017 Garrisonjames. Used by permission.'

OSR Commentary B/X Dungeons & Dragons Blues plus Lovecraftian Underworlds

Lizardman on giant lizard (David Sutherland from the Holmes/blue book Basic D&D rulebook, TSR, 1977)

So lately I've been falling back in with B/X Dungeons & Dragons as well as Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition spliced with Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition & Adventurer, Conqueror, King. So like every other OSR Dungeon Master out there I mix & match systems. House rule where & when necessary. So there's no 'perfect' system, I waffle about Goblinoid Games Labyrinth Lord.

Then suddenly I'm back to B/X like an ex girl friend sure we've had our differences but she knows my needs. There's always one prevailing ideal throughout Dungeons & Dragons regardless of edition. The idea of the dungeon as entrance to the 'mythological underworld.'  
Lovecraft dabbled, skirted & outright plugged into the notion of the Chthonic underworld for his Cthulhu Mythos novels  especially the blatantly racist Horror At Red Hook. As an Italian descendant of immigrants I find Lovecraft's New England curmudgeon racism laughable one hundred years later. Lovecraft like many other writers of the time was a product of his times. The wiki entry on the Horror At Red Hook makes his sources abundantly clear but given his gifts of the Cthulhu Mythos to the world & as patronage of other writers of his circle.


""Lovecraft referred to the area's immigrant population by referring to Red Hook as "a maze of hybrid squalor".^[3] He spelled out his inspiration for "The Horror at Red Hook" in a letter written to fellow writer Clark Ashton Smith: The idea that black magic exists in secret today, or that hellish antique rites still exist in obscurity, is one that I have used and shall use again. When you see my new tale "The Horror at Red Hook", you will see what use I make of the idea in connexion with the gangs of young loafers & herds of evil-looking foreigners that one sees everywhere in New York""

Lovecraft stands as a walking contradiction of his times both as product & writer. Dismissing Lovecraft as simply an "American horror asshole writer of the 1920's" misses the point. Simply ignoring the history of racisim doesn't make it go away but instead let's it take root again in a society that has long since moved on (or have we).

 

But the real heart of the strangeness of the 'Horror At Red Hook'  is the warrens, tunnels, & underworld of Lovecraft's  New York City; we see  places & lairs so dangerous that given ghouls, cannibal families, & more makes New York City a superb dungeon location. But there are others along the Eastern Seaboard of America that cut right into the early traditions of science fiction & Weird tales style stories. 

I've been rereading a lot of the early science fiction pulp adventures & 'lost world' novellas, a name that I've seen come up repeatedly is L. (Lucile) Taylor Hansen. She was one of the early Gernsback science fiction writers who used a male writing name. She's not that well known out of certain pulp, lost world, & early science fiction groups. "L. (Lucile) Taylor Hansen is the author of eight short stories, nearly sixty nonfiction articles popularizing anthropology and geology, and three nonfiction books."
Her writing hit on many controversial aspects of science fiction speculation & minor dogma such as the last vestiges of scientific racism which fell away in the years before World War II.
 But one of her earliest tales "The Undersea Tube", her first published story, took the cover of the November 1929 issue of Amazing Stories 

& contains a several very interesting tid bits including an international underworld tube train, the volcanic dangers associated with such a network, & a possible colony of
subterranean civilization, the realm of K'n-yan! Under the Atlantic Basin there could be a network of tunnels & subterranean cities waiting for just the right moment to unleash hoards of under horrors & incredible monsters upon the upper realm.


Because that's exactly what happens upon 'Old Earth' in my current line of a campaign. But it also means that the subtrains of Empire of the Petal Throne & Gamma World have been with us for a very long time. There might be countless cities of the under Earth both inhabited and abandoned waiting for adventurers to find em.
Even Edgar Rice Burroughs made certain references to such possible underworld cities & locations. Pulp Pecullidar by Den Valdron has some excellent  connections in it outlined & referenced leaving a wealth of possible adventure lead ins for an enterprising DM to exploit. For an Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Dungeon master there are all kinds of possible connections and such to exploit for adventure design.

Using WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun By Gary Gygax For AD&D 1st Edition As Sword & Sorcery Jump Off Point

I've been quietly thinking about WG4 The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun & adapting it to my 'Old Earth' setting along the lines of Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique. The Norkers are the key here, now since I'm going to be running this with a combination of Adventurer, Conqueror, King & Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition.


The key here is the Norkers which in 'Old Earth' were/are workers for heavy gravity worlds mining for ores & other precious metals because of their exoskeleton frame work, tremendous strength, resilience, & outright tenacity. So they've been imported back to old Earth by the semi demonic/human hobgoblins. Norkers make perfect workers for Hell planets like Io.


Hobgoblins were developed from human races after 'the War of the Ancients.'  Hobgoblins have been developed by the Ancients to form both a demonically  bred military force & a  race for sacrifice upon the altars for a variety of Lovecraftian gods. They've settled into the wastelands of what was once China & parts of the panhandle of the Orient. They rule over vast numbers of humans surrounded by human states that wage war back & forth with them.



The Gnomes which form the basis for part of the plot of 'The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun' need a bit of a make over. They  become Celts or Picts in this redress of  I'm leaning far more toward the Picts end of the spectrum because of the Robert Howard connection. The Norkers are raiding their settlements & one time the Ancients used to sacrifice the Picts to the god thing Tharizdun.



Tharizdun was/is another old one from Saturn whose worship came back into vague just before the Great Plagues swept the Earth & its colonies throughout the solar system. But that was a very long time ago and its only recently that the vaults have been opened again.
The question is will the madness continue to spread across 'Old Earth'.


Well having run S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth By Gary Gygax yesterday for Privait Con 2017 it only seems natural that I'd turn my attention to one of my all time favorite Greyhawk adventures Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun By Gary Gygax. I've adapted it a couple of times but now I'm seriously looking into taking the adventure apart & adapting it into a campaign cornerstone.

Play Session Report For S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth By Gary Gygax & Actual Play Event At Privait Con 2017

Privait Con 2017 came off in the hills of North Western Connecticut today without a hitch. What is Privait Con? Well its a small gathering of like minded OSR war gamers & OSR Dungeons & Dragons players for a private Con that's been happening for around five years solid now. About fifteen people showed up in today in Litchfield Ct at an undisclosed location. Its been happening for those who couldn't make North Texas Con & Gary Gon, Privait Con always happens right after Halloween each year.
Today I got a chance to try some new beers & get in a game or two of Avalon Hill's Wooden Ships & Ironmen

I lost spectacularly but it was a great game to have a chance to play again.


Since the Con was already going on for three days prior to my Sunday slot I had agreed to run a classic adventure with an AS&SH twist to get the blood pumping.

"In the Yatil Mountains south of Perrenland there is rumored to be a magical hoard of unsurpassed value, a treasure of such fame that scores of adventurers have perished in search of it. Find the perilous Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth and you may gain the hidden wealth of the long-dead arch-mage — if you live."

Cover blurb for The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth
I DM's some Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition using The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth in full competition mode. The PC's were investigating rumors of treasure west of the capital of Hyperborea. We lost three PC's in the wilderness just outside of the dungeon complex & things went wickedly from there. This adventure took up a good chunk of my afternoon and into the evening. Everything came off without a hitch and it was a solid little private Con held by friends!



I ran S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth By Gary Gygax as if it was a part of my 'Old Earth' setting where S4 takes place as a part of Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique cycle in the far future. The PC's heard rumors that the second that Drelzna awakens she's going to revive the cults that were responsible for the imprisoned god Tharizdun & bring the horrors of  the Black Cyst upon the face of 'Old Earth' as a part of the rumors of the adventure. But the wilderness had a minor statue to  Thasaidon "black god of evil", "the archfiend", "lord of the seven hells beneath the earth". But it was the Tcho Tcho mercenaries in the wild that claimed the lives of the party's wizard, thief, and slayer. This cost the players in the long run on the dungeon levels. The other players brought in new PC's and they plowed and powered on through the dungeon levels but it cost them another wizard & a necromancer!


But what really seemed to draw the player's attention was the Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Second edition hardback that one of the players had received as a part of his Kickstarter reward.
Here's my review of the pdf but if you don't believe it then check out those Drivethrurpg reviews here. My oh not so subtle suggestion is to grab your copy before they disappear for awhile my experiences with small style print and gaming runs over the years has been interesting.

One of the AS&SH second edition hardbacks from Jeff's G+ page.

All in all Privait Con 2017 was a pretty solid event this year for our OSR gamer's group and next year promises to be better! So that's all from the Northwest corner of Connecticut on a Sunday evening!

1d20 Random Deadly Sword & Sorcery Encounter Table With The Royalty of Undeath For Your Old School Campaigns

"Echoing foot falls sounded through the dusty canyon of the old mountains, older then when life had paid its tax to the universe. These rocks throbbed with occult energies beyond the ken of man's knowledge. For the three wizard's apprentices it just might become their graves. They had awoken something ancient, mean, & evil. Now it wanted their hides!
"Do you see it?"
"No but I can feel it, you didn't see those pits it had for eyes!"

"Shut up & run!" The words weren't spoken so much as croaked out of the throat of the poor fool.
"Can't do that I must turn back. He calls me. Can't you hear his voice", & with heavy foot falls the former wizard's apprentice turned & trudged the five miles back to the barely tumbled down pile of rocks & stone that might be ruins.
There were hoof beats approaching closer but in a lazy almost casual fashion. The flanks of the creature had almost horse like outlines but the black energies that passed for not flesh were incredibly alien. Their merest outlines hurt the eyes.

They left the poor fool there.When the thing crested the hill as the others had long since left. Black energies coiled out of what was once centuries maybe a thousand years ago a humanoid skull. The thing was majestic & the definition of evil in the rusted old armor, the weapons though were lovingly oiled, the leather bits worked with care. But that demonic horror seated on the back of a mockery of a horse was not even remotely human. Its eye sockets gleamed with energies from the deepest pits of a nether universe where dead stars gleamed around the souls of the damned. 
Urine rain down the leg of the apprentice as his will had long since faded as soon his life would. His soul belonged to the thing on the hillock not far away. What might have been mistaken for a smile crossed the countenance of the thing but it was only the moonlight gleaming off of the bones that pulsed with alien energies. A hand began to work the lovingly tendered sword & its side"

 

Cover of the pulp magazine Weird Tales (March 1946, vol. 39, no. 4) featured Twice Cursed by Manly Wade Wellman. Cover art by Lee Brown Coye.

The wastelands & graveyards of the dead are the fields & cities of the living, there are countless dead that do not rest easy in their graves. But there are far more alien things waiting in these places for PC's! The dead don't rest easy & don't want to give up their grip on reality, as they hunger for the life & souls of the living. Darker & far more sinister things fuel the lives of these monsters & there is a hunger that is never satisfied.


Cover of the pulp magazine Weird Tales (January 1944, vol. 37, no. 3) featuring Bon Voyage, Michele by Seabury Quinn and The Golden Goblins by Manly Wade Wellman. Cover art by Harold S. De Lay. Published by Weird Tales, Inc.)

These dark thirsts summon demons & worse from the depths of the underworld to drag these horrors back down to the darkest depths. Dungeons, ruins, & other far more sinister place call to these horrors & PC's are the easiest prey for these monsters.


Cover of the pulp magazine Weird Tales (September 1944, vol. 38, no. 1) featuring The Long Still Streets of Evening by Frank Owen. Cover art by A. R. Tilburne.

“Denn die Todten reiten Schnell. (For the dead travel fast.)”

― Bram Stoker, Dracula


1d20 Random Deadly Sword & Sorcery Encounter Table
With The Royalty of Undeath 

1. A decayed lich prince of ancient aspect along with his 1d8 huntsmen from Hell have come to hunt for the souls of the living! 
2. An ancient decayed Viking berserk still animated by the souls of the slain come for more from the living. He has double the hit points of a wight and an enchanted +2 sword
3. An ancient queen fat with decay and souls of sacrificed victims has 1d6 ghosts astrally tied to her seeking victims for her hungers! She is a vicious zombie of incredibly dangerous intelligence. 
4. A lost zombie prince with a demon sword seeks to slay any living to feed his horrid habits and resurrect his people to slay the living. 
5. An ancient horde of undead ghouls is actually the former royal court of the land and now seek the flesh of the living to assume their chosen place and resurrect their king a death knight. 
6. An ancient explorer long expired in an ancient distant land now seeks to return to his former homeland four hundred years later after being lost in the underworld. He has been under a curse of necromancy and horror. Treat him as an embodied who anyone he slays joins him. Currently there are 1d10 zombies in bondage to him. 
7. A slain royal cleric has come back due to a curse and she now wanders the night as a ghoul to pray on the living. Her victims join her as her pack. There are 1d4 ghouls following and slaying for her. 
8. A royal burrow has been disturbed and the king wanders the night feeding upon the living passing the curse of the wight to others around him. They are forced to give him their souls as they pass on.
9. A princess slain eight centuries ago has come back as a semi living girl with no memory of  her time in the underworld. At night she roams the night as a vampire & witch slaying the living for their souls to fuel her revenge against a local royal family
10. Three ghouls wander the night in search of their princes lost among the living. They ride ghasts searching the kingdoms as unknown knights on a quest slaying monsters and other horrors. They are in service to a minor god of death. 
11. An ancient colour from space has been released from inside the body of an alien royal king. There are nine wights of alien aspect roaming the night feeding on the living and passing on the souls of them to the thing as it gets ready to break free from its nest. 
12. Twelve zombie disciplines search the night for their undead messiah of royal aspect. They slay anyone they come across. These horrors were all once princes of the local area. 
13. An alien tomb of a royal prince has been disturbed and a demon has been released it haunts the dreams of the living as it devours the souls of the local children. A prince's soul has been devoured and now he roams the night as a vampire seeking adventurers to slay him.
14.   1d4 zombies of royal priests roam the night in search for a magical artifact to cure them of their curse. But they must feed on the living and curse anyone they come across with their disease. 
15. Five ghosts of ancient kings need the souls of 12 maidens to join them in the afterlife of the underworld or they shall become the property of horrid demon lord. 
16. A necromancer to a royal court 2oo miles away released a demon from the king's private temple and he's become possessed by the thing. He's now a vampire of incredibly dangerous aspect and roams the night slaying any and all he comes across. The king has a bounty on his head. 
17. Eight queens of the night are shadows of themselves as  vampires & have been released by a careless princess. Their curse causes them to slay the living & seek the souls of innocents for their demonic succubus mistress. The princess has become a slayer of the undead but she needs help. Her curse is starting to take effect. Will she join them or not. 
18. Five ghoul princes seek the hand of a witch queen but she is trapped beneath a village in the underworld and only the souls of outlaws & adventurers can free them. Guess whose on the menu. 
19. Three vampire kings seek to conquer the land but they must have the sword of the ancient hero. The thing is guarded by a Lovcraftian horror and perhaps a group of outlaws can succeed. 
20. An ancient undead god of thunder & lightning has arisen from his ancient tomb and he seeks heroes to slay him or he will release a horde of zombie Viking warriors from their burrow.
    
    
    
    Who fares to find the sunset ere it fly,
    Turning to light and fire the further west,
    Shall have the veils of twilight for his guest,
    And all the falling of an ashen sky.
    
    On lands he shall not know, the splendor lies—
    A pharos on some alienated shore,
    In foam and purple lost forevermore,
    Where dreams are kindled in remoter eyes.
    
    Ashes of Sunset  (1922)
    by Clark Ashton Smith
    
    

OSR Commentary On The Kingdoms of Dust & Sand 'X4 Master Of The Desert Nomads' By David 'Zeb' Cook For Expert Dungeons & Dragons & Your Old School Campaigns

"To arms! To arms! The battle lines are drawn as desert men and inhuman tribes wait poised to strike on the fertile and rich lands of the east. The call has gone out through the civilized lands. The armies have been raised to match the invading foes from the west. Nobles and peasants have joined swords to greet the foes.

But Fate or Chance has decreed another role for a small few. No glorious banners will wave on their march. No squadrons of knights will charge at their word. Instead, they will fight the war through stealth, secrecy, and cunning. The risks they will take are great, but the fates of both armies lie with them.

It begins one night for your party far from the fighting. Suddenly you are entrusted with the most dangerous missions of the war. Can you cross the Sind Desert, occupied now by enemy armies, to find the Great Pass? Can you find the one known only as The Master? What will you do if your do find him?"


I've been thinking about a Sword & Sorcery adventure to get my ACK's/Astonishing Swordmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second Fall campaign off the ground. I've been carefully looking into X4 Master of The Desert Nomads. Recently I've looked into using David 'Zeb' Cook's B6 The Veiled Society with AS&SH second edition for an urban adventure.

But I'm really interested in, " X4: "Master of the Desert Nomads" (1983), by David "Zeb" Cook, is the fourth adventure in the Expert series for Basic D&D and the first adventure in the Desert Nomads duology. It was published in 1983." Why? Because this adventure to me has a very hard pulpy Sword & Sorcery core to it in my mind. Everything in X4 is completely centered around the plotcentric adventure's structure, encounters, & it just seems like the sort of a high octane adventure that would work well for both ACK's & AS&SH.

Dipping its sword deep into the sandy soil of cultists, weird desert goings on, & outright weirdness X4 is one part hex crawl, two parts high adventure, & one solid romp into the back part of the Sind erm Diamond desert of Hyperborea. Because this is one of those adventures that can work on multiple levels as it goes from hex crawl to fully formed D&D wilderness romp of the weird. X4 loves to pull out all of the stops on its  toe crawling into the Weird Tales end of things. Connect B6 The Veiled Society & X4 Master of the Desert Nomads and you've got a one way ticket for your party of adventurers to wander right into the back end of no place squared on purpose.



"The village on the border of the Republic of Darokin there is a priest  looking for scouts to seek out the Master a mysterious figure who is uniting the various tribes of humans and humanoids in the Sind desert. The Republic's army forces have already moved out and the PC's are left behind to fill in on this dangerous mission." This is a mid level adventure where Elric in his best mercenary mode wouldn't feel out of place in & neither should your PC's. They're in full 'screwed adventurer mode' dealing with the consequences of mopping up over the spilled blood & guts of a pulpy classic adventure plot device.
The first half of the adventure deals with the PC's journey to the master and the second deals with their handling of an evil abbey which has its own darkness that looks like it came straight out of a Clark Ashton Smith novella. But another option is to hook the plot of X4 into a network of evil where the lich master of the Veiled Society is part of a greater network of undeath horror operating within the bounds of Hyperborea.




I'm talking about using 'The Master' of X4 Master of The Desert Nomads as a framing device for a campaign. The wastelands of X4 have a number of treasures & relics interconnected to its adventure central plot. Imagine that 'The Master' is in fact another survivor of 'Old Earth' similar to Robert Howard's Skull Face.

An Atlantian survivor of the worst kind that interweaves with Robert  Howard's Steve Costigan character.  
"The story stars a character called Steve Costigan but this is not Howard's recurring character, Sailor Steve Costigan. The story is clearly influenced by Sax Rohmer's opus Fu Manchu but substitutes the main Asian villain with a resuscitated Atlantean necromancer (very similar to Kull's arch-foe Thulsa Doom) sitting at the center of a web of crime and intrigue meant to end White/Western world domination."
There is evidence to suggest that Kathulos might have actually been a part of a secret order of necromancers from Atlantis similar to Clark Ashton Smith's The Empire of the Necromancers. Possibly echoing lost survivors of ancient Atlantis showing up in later future epochs of Earth such as Zothique.
"The legend of Mmatmuor and Sodosma shall arise only in the latter cycles of Earth, when the glad legends of the prime have been forgotten. Before the time of its telling, many epochs shall have passed away, and the seas shall have fallen in their beds, and new continents shall have come to birth. Perhaps, in that day, it will serve to beguile for a little the black weariness of a dying race, grown hopeless of all but oblivion. I tell the tale as men shall tell it in Zothique, the last continent, beneath a dim sun and sad heavens where the stars come out in terrible brightness before eventide."




There's some thought & opinions among friends of mine that X4 could be connected to AS&SH's  Ghost Ship of the Desert Dunes as a side quest or vice versa. X4 could also be linked up with Robert E. Howard's The Fire of Asshurbanipal's lost city

Illustration by Justin Sweet of the Kull of Atlantis character Thulsa Doom.


The attitudes, mannerisms, & goals of many of the living & undead wizards of not only Robert Howard's writing but of the entire Lovecraft circle are overall not only strikingly similar but strangely dovetail into one another.
"Tsotha-Lanti (in the Conan saga) and Kathulos (in the Skull Face novelette); other living or revenant Howardian practitioners of magic such as Thoth Amon, Thugra Khotan, Kathulos and Xaltotun bear some psychological similitudes to Thulsa Doom even if their outward appearance is vastly different."

What this means is that the central themes of dark Sword & Sorcery action from X4 Master of the Desert Nomads might not be an accident at all. This is a module series with a vastly different feel from other Expert Dungeons & Dragons adventures. There could be a vast network of liches & undead moving the strings of events behind the scenes of Hyperborea. In  terms of domain level play it means that there could be a series of shadow wars being played out in the days & nights of Hyperborea. The PC's are none the wiser until they blunder into the events of these shadow wars. At the conclusion of the events of the X series  the Republic of Darokin might well be up for grabs by the PC's but can they hold on to the kingdom and its environs or are there other undead eyes following the PC's rise to power? Because X4 The Master of the Desert Nomads is a mid range module its a perfect module to drop the PC's into the thick of the adventure to help set them up for leveling up to carve out kingdoms of their own.

OSR Review & Commentary On Flower Liches of the Dragonboat Festival From Kabuki Kaiser For Your Old School Campaigns

"When omens portend ill fortune for the city, the priests call upon a Dragonboat Festival: a racing competition gathering swift boatmen from all over the continent. Their ancient chants call forth the powers of the undying, waking the Flower Liches from their distant graves. For a week, the liches roam the city freely, and oversee the race, taking the losing crews as tributes and sacrifices. Once the Dragonboat Festival is finished and the liches disappear, the city's prosperity is magically replenished, and all the monetary wealth the citizenry had before the festival — player characters included — is doubled."
I was recently sent a copy of  "Flower Liches of the Dragonboat Festival" From  Kabuki Kaiser   is both adventure & setting  resource book that can be dropped into your home campaign. The adventure channels as much of the Wuxia ghost vibe as it does the Asian pulp Dungeons & Dragons vibe as the author can pack into one of his efforts. This is an adventure that dips liberally from its sources & the warped imaginings of its author. Much like his Mad Monks of Kwantoom   OSR campaign & setting book the mythological/pulp Asian world of  P. Crespy  Flower Liches presents a world & adventure that is both familiar & utterly new. In point of fact both of these products would work extremely well together.



The artwork, lay out, & presentation is a bit different then other efforts of the author/designer, in this adventure everything dovetails into a seamless product that presents a world of the weird & very dangerous centeral to its setting. There are things to do, experience, and dangers ever present within '/The Flower Liches of The Dragon Boat Festival'. This adventure centers around the party circling and creating weirdness for the party to get themselves into all kinds of trouble.
If presentation is everything within an adventure then this one has some stunning writing, plots, and OSR artwork. The combination reminds me of a Saturday afternoon Kung Fu theater flick. Slick on its presentation and long on its adventure hooks! Everything is double downed on in this adventure from the Kung Fu action to the supernatural horror.

Here's an adventure where the dangers to PC's pale in comparison to the weirdness infecting the adventure throughout. PC's are going to have their hands full and clocking in at ninety five pages there's plenty of dungeon and supernatural action to be had. This is a Labyrinth Lord adventure but it has the look & feel of a Lamentations of the Flame Princess line effort but without the lingering adult nonsense to get in the way of play.  'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' is clearly easily adaptable to any OSR game.


There is a sense of whimsy but deadliness about this adventure & it stands to reason that it would given the writer's passions for Asian culture & pop culture Kung Fu. The fact is that dungeon master has another full stop world book & source book in this adventure for a full South Asian style setting. This works as a set up for a full campaign starting city point in such a campaign. From hirelings to starting equipment 'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' is clearly designed for such a purpose & very well designed to do this at that!  'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' works with both Labryth Lord & The Advanced Companion in equal
measure.



The real strength of 'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' lays in the fact that it serves as a fantastic source book for  'Mad Monks of Kwantoom'. In this regard its a great source book & add on for this or really any pulp Asian flavored style campaign setting. But it really fits into the world of 'Mad Monks'. Because of its mini game included the adventure has some solid replay abilities. The hirelings, background, encounters, etc. are all inductive of a popculture far East and it works.



I can also see 'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' being used for a post apocalyptic world such as Mutant Future in which cultures are looking to the 'Ancients' for their divine inspiration. The liches take full advantage of the gullible human fools & the result is the world spot lighted in this adventure/source book. 
Another possibility that  'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats' could be used for a human centric land in 'Apes Victorious' where these humans have used the power of the liches to resist the onslaught of the advancing ape army. So adjustments will have to be made to use
'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats'  with Apes Victorious. Another possibility for campaign use is to drop the setting of 'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats'  into 'Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea second edition' whole sale again there is a bit of adjustment as a possible South Asia analog. For Sword & Sorcery play this is an excellent book & tool kit to add such a mix.
In closing is this isn't a perfect to kit to add to the mix of campaign play for old school style campaign. It clocks in at ninety five pages & to tell the truth I wish there was a bit more fluff connective tissue with this book. There needs to be more here and it I want to know more about 'this' world and not simply use this book as another drag & drop book for campaign play. So in closing a solid four out of five for 'Flower Liches of the Dragon Boats'. 

Flower Liches of the Dragonboat Festival Is Available Right Here