A blog about sewing machine repairs,but mainly my hobbies which include old school role playing games, science fiction,films, horror, and general geekery. Sit down and stay a spell.
Anyhow work has had me in fits today. And I'm going to be taking a vacation from behind the screen to once again playing in front of it. I'm going to be playing a supernatural investigator slash sorcerous hero in DM Steve's Vigilante City campaign. What does this have to do with Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg?! Well quite a bit actually.
In the burnt out ruins of a rebuild New York under human control after an alien invasion. Some sixteen year old has gotten a hold of a summoning scroll that was going to be aucutioned off for charity. Needless to say the thackless sixteen year old summoned something that ate not only him & the entire block. Now it's up to our group of contract heroes to go in & access the situation. The Regulators has been an ongoing campaign with Steve's group for months using an old super hero rpg propped up using Bloat Games Vigilante City rpg books. The campaign has been based partially on Cosmic Enforcer rpg campaign world. Cosmic Enforcers was a 1995 super-hero tabletop role-playing game. It had an interesting mix of superhumans and gritty sci-fi.Various Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg adventures have bled through as background with several of the major NPC villains being demons & refugees from LoFP's Carcosa. The thing that ate this particular block of New York City real estate isn't something my magician hero has ever encountered!
This game has been playing out like 'The Boys' meets Lovecraft in a back alleyway. I'm coming into this as a contract hero whose back up from Florida on a bounty to recover the relic. That relic was the summon spell scroll in a jeweled case worth about 50,000. mega dollars. Apparently DM Steve 'borrowed' the idea of doing this mix from my facebook from David Okum from wayback when Bloat Games Vigilante City rpg books. The other thing that he borrowed from James Raggi III is the idea that anyone can die at anytime. Monsters in this campaign have come straight outta of the Random Esoteric Creature Generator for Classic Fantasy Rpgs & Their Modern Simulacra.
From what I understand this has been a brutal campaign.
CE's version of New York is controlled by mega corporations & criminal gangs. The streets have been rife with otherworldly drugs & crime. And there's a thriving occult underground based on many of the Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg adventures such as 'Better Then Any Man' and many others. Several of the alien races, criminals, etc all come straight outta of Bloat Games Scorched.
Wish me luck my time with the regulators might be very short indeed!
" Welcome to the nightmarish realms of the Wretchedverse, where horrors lurk around every corner, and the darkness hides untold terrors. Wretched Darkness is a mature horror role-playing game where players take on the roles of anti-hero characters who must face the unknown and confront the supernatural and the paranormal head-on. Wretched Darkness may be played as a dark fantasy game, or you can make it into an actual horror experience. Players can choose from several factions for their characters, some already featured in previous Wretched games, such as the Knights of Cydonnia, BurroughsTech, the Araknyd Brotherhood and the Daughters of Ksenia, and a few new ones, like the Warden Foundation and the Children of the Night."
"By default, the game is set in modern times, in urban environments, where danger lurks at every turn and death is never far away. However, you can use it to play horror games in different timelines. Combine it with Wretched Époque or Wretched Country for a 19th-century terrifying experience, pair it up with Wretched New Flesh - Postcards from Avalidad for a near-future surrealistic horror campaign, jump into the far future by using Wretched Space, or set it in any other age. This book presents you with a sandbox-style setting inspired by the works of masters of horror, such as Clive Barker, David Cronenberg, David Lynch, John Carpenter, George Romero, Wes Craven, Dario Argento, Tobe Hooper, Lucio Fulci and Mario Bava, but expect sources of inspiration as varied as William Burroughs, Charles Bukowski, William Gibson, Paul Auster, exploitation movies and Leonard Cohen’s poetry."
"As a Game Master, you will find here tools and game mastering hints for running any style of horror game, such as Giallo, gore, supernatural, psychological, apocalyptic, surreal, sci-fi horror and more. Wretched Darkness uses a revised version of the Wretched mechanics, an old-school set of rules designed for playing characters that are not necessarily good or virtuous. The revised rules are still entirely compatible with previous versions. Still, they include new mechanics for sanity and the use of magic, as well as several new classes and playable races, such as Incubus/ Succubus, Loup-Garou, and the Wampyr. Player characters are also more vulnerable than they were in previous Wretched games: The Hit Point increase was downgraded (now, by default, you don’t roll for Hit Points when you level up, you only get 1 additional point per level), and the level cap is set at 10."
Miguel Ribeiro of the authors of The Wretched Darkness rpg
Wretched Darkness is a four hundred & seventy six page OSR horror rpg game that has quite a few difference from other Wretchedverse games. And that difference is the amount of care, work, planning, & thought that went into Wretched Darkness. Wretched Darkness is an OSR horror rpg game but it's one that can handle anytime frame from modern to hardcore ancient Lovecraftian themes or adventures.
Wretched Darkness falls hard on the adult side with lots of horror tropes & adventure cavets that one comes to expect in the horror gerne. The usuaul suspect PC classes are here from the chaos magicians all the way to the murdering psychopathic killer. What set's Wretched Darkness apart is the how & why of it's OSR systems. the Wretched Darkness rpg has the vibes of a Kult style OSR game. The Wretched Darkness rpg has the potential to really take in the 90's style Golden Age horror movie like campaign in spades. Wretched Darkness lives up to it's OSR roots but incorporates a whole host of new systems that really bring home the horror as both personal adventure or full on campaign. Then there's several optional tarot card systems that can be used as 'horror adventure tool kit' in it's appendixs. And this is only one small part of Wretched Darkness.
Wretched Darkness takes the horror adventure center stage as a solid OSR horror game that really ups the themes & ideas of the other Wretchedverse rpg games. Then it breaks off the knob of the volume & it does this by being a game that incorporates tons of factions, bits of magick, reams of supernatural lore, and more. But these are optional allowing the DM or players to bring the customization factor into the Wretched Darkness game itself. The pdf for Wretched Darkness is massive & yet I really want a printing of the game to truly cement it as a cornerstone of the Red Room's rpg systems.
And it's this cornerstone approach that makes Wretched Darkness rpg that will work well with Wretched Époqueor Wretched Country for a 19th-century horror campaign or it can be used with Wretched New Flesh - Postcards from Avalidadfor a Science Fantasy horror campaign,or as a jump off point into an OSR horror game fueled by Wretched Space especially combined with Venger Satanis's Cha'alt. And this is one of the strength's of Wretched Darkness it's ability to be adapted again & again to various niches of horror from it's own corner of OSR gaming. For me as a reviewer Wretched Darkness is a five outta of five.
"Mordiggian is the god of Zul-Bha-Sair," said the innkeeper with unctuous solemnity. "He has been the god from years that are lost to man's memory in shadow deeper than the subterranes of his black temple. There is no other god in Zul-Bha-Sair. And all who die within the walls of the city are sacred to Mordiggian. Even the kings and the optimates, at death, are delivered into the hands of his muffled priests. It is the law and the custom. A little while, and the priests will come for your bride." The Charnel God By Clark Ashton Smith
Rodney Mathews artwork used without permission. No copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Zul-Bha-Sair is exactly the type of city that one might find on Zothique & yet not exactly be your typical fantasy city. On the whole Zul-Bha-Sair is a city that is entirely peaceful unless your PC dies here. And then all bets are off as the silver masked priests claim the body. They have the backing of one of the last of the Great Old Ones for "All who die in Zul-Bha-Sair are the property of Mordiggian. " And on the whole that one statement brings into sharp focus the fact that Mordiggian isn't a god that shall be refused his due. Castles & Crusades necromancers are not usually mentioned in the long list of vile villains of the game. However adventures like Mark Taormino's 'Shadow of the Necromancer' takes on a whole new pale in lands such as Zul-Bha-Sair.
Zul-Bha-Sair's silver faced priests of Mordiggan might actually employ the PC's to stop the necromancer. The PC's take on the holy mission of Mordiggian to stop such a dangerous & perverse abomination because the dead don't rest easy within the lands of Zul-Bha-Sair. Yes, the undead are nothing more then actually horrors that should not be in the eyes of Mordiggian. The god may be a monster but it's a monster that serves the people of Zothique in several ways. This Great Old one keeps plague, disease, and other threats down away from the living. These & other services come at the price of the cults of Mordiggian. Prices that the people of Zothique are more then willing to pay. And this brings up the grey lines of alignment on Zothique itself. This is something players are going to have to deal with. These lines of good & evil are blurred as The Charnel God By Clark Ashton Smith shows time & again. Treasure & coin are not going to be a problem for the silver masked priests of Mordiggian. They have access to unending treasures of the underworld of Zothique & are more then the PC's know. I've used the silver faced priests of Mordiggan before as patrons for parties in Castles & Crusades. The reactions have been mixed as clerics of Mordiggan have been mixed in with our regular parties of adventurers on Zothique. The power of the charnel god has been a blessing especially with hordes of undead. Even though the cleric was human we had suspisions about his ancestry that proved key within a certain adventure involving another kingdom on Zothique.
The Charnel God By Clark Ashton Smith is one of the key Zothique stories in my mind. Why?! Because of the richness of the amount of background that we get on the whole of the world of Zothique. The ways & norms of Zothique are completely alien. This is especially true of the lands of Zul-Bha-Sair. From pauper to king no one escapes the silver priest's grasp. And this leads to many complications for resurrections of PC's and NPC's. For no one man escapes them & this is escpecially true of thier human clerics in the lands of Zothique. Because of the unusual nature of the silver faced masked priests. The first place to start with this is the Castle Keeper's Guide. There are several systems within the Castle Keeper's Guide for variations of clerics & thier systems. There's also a great deal more information on Mordiggan & his clerics within the D20 Zothique pdf as well. This information should be kept in mind when creating adventures within the lands of Zul-Bha-Sair.
This session report is going to pick right up from yesterday's review of Cyclops. Just tonight we arrived on Cyclops & were thawed out inside the crater.Cyclops is an up & coming world in Hostile but it's a world of conflict. We could feel the whole crater & it's easy going towns as nothing more then powder kegs waiting to happen. Our Blackguard detachment were posing as drovers & ranch hands. So we blended in with the latest batch of workers to the Cyclops colony.
We were a bit outgunned as we had to make due with side arms & none of our usual kit. This meant buying weapons on Cyclops & we were at a disavantage as well. We had a meeting with our employer a rival rancher who wanted answers as too why the miners were being stirred up. We were there for a series of bounties on terrorists who were using the mining operations as cover.
We spent this game circulating among the local population & making contact with our local inside men. Arrangements, food, and safehouses were done among the colonists & drovers of Cyclops. Something wasn't right off the bat. We had a sniper inciden in town tonight & this isn't a common occurance. This was followed a day later by a bomb threat & it almost took out one of our party. We wanted & needed answers. What we got!? We got drugged & kidnapped then left out in the Hitherlands! This is where tonight's game ended.
""Grind us down. Exploit us. Push us so far... well that's far enough. Now we're taking over. It's our turn to push back."
A supplement for the Hostile RPG and Cepheus Engine.
"Oberman is the corporate governor of this cold desert world, that is low in oxygen. And the miners are revolting – literally. High radiation from UV and the ore they mine has induced genetic mutation. The miners are an underclass that have begun a rebellion…. but Oberman is cracking down."
"The major settlements on Cyclops are located within a 12 km deep asteroid crater, where water, farmland and air exists, supporting colonists and serving as a headquarters for the corporation. Their life is easier than that of the miners on the highlands, but the two worlds are about to clash, and the player characters are going to be caught in the middle."
"This is a play box of setting, locations, main characters, supporting NPCs, toys and other hardware, maps and plot suggestions. Dip in, mix and match, stay alive on a forbidding world!"
Paul Elliot from Zozer games contacted me about Cyclops yesterday & sent me the PdF the same day. Cyclops couldn't come at a better time. We've got our usual Hostile rpg tonight & Cyclops is going to be the main focus. We usuallly use Zozer games product videos as 'player hand outs'. This gets the players up to speed & gives them a thumb nail snap shot of the situation.
In this case the situation on the desert world of Cyclops is a combination of the Eighties film Hardware & Chronicles of Riddick.Cyclops is the perfect world for a group of bounty dogs & tin badges to take on the miner or the corporate situation under the corporate governorOberman. And Cyclops is a harsh world without a doubt. And player's PC's are going to half too watch thier step because every side is going to have to watch thier step. All of the wonderful little traps & tricks that come with a full on corporate colony rebellion are in full swing on Cyclops. And the factions are at each other's throats within this Hostile world supplement book.
Cyclops is really well laid out and the feel of an old fashioned 70's Western film mixed in with the politics of a classic such as Outlands is something that really jumps out to me as a DM. You've got interesting adventure set pieces, full on political & corporate intrigue, deadly NPC's and a full on & fully fleshed out alien planet within Cyclops.
The stakes here are high because the profits are incredible so is the danger.
Players are going to have to bring thier 'A' game here to really know how & why thier supporting the 'right side' of the rebellion. There's also money to be made here on Cyclops & lots of it for PC's.
While there's lots of A.I. here in Cyclops. This is well done & actually fits the world really well. And it adds volumes to the factions, set up, gear, and the whole general feel of Cyclops as living and breathing setting. The idea of the miners having to contend with mutation & radiation induced genetic damage to themselves & their kids is both harrowing & bites into the whole feel of the setting book. But is Cyclops worth the four dollars?!
Sorry, I had to really look hard at the price tag on Cyclops! Four dollars for thirty five pages of well laid out, professional looking, and solidly fonted Hostile setting & adventure booklet all under the banner of a self contained world?! Seriously if you're into the Hostile rpg then your gonna want this book.
Cyclops is a really complicated world & echoes so many Eighties Science Fiction film tropes. It also echoes other Western tropes as well," The down & out miners vs the greedy miner bosses or owners with thier minions". Yes, it's a story we've seen a million times on a Saturday afternoon Million dollar movie on cable in the Eighties. And it's exactly these points that make Cyclops a really well done univeral Cepheus Engine rpg supplement. And Cyclops could easily slot into Independence Games Space Western Setting Earth Sector with little problem. The corporate intrigue, the strung out miners, the hostile and dangerous world, it all fits right into Earth Sector so easily..
Let's pick it up as the heroes have made it back to New Ashford from back here last game. New Ashford was quiet & snowbound but something is tracking the player's PC's! The horror is invisible & the players think that it's because of thier time travel & other dimensional hijinks. Man O Metal has returned to the party's fold & is kinda spooked out. Upon return the players found a Tallman avitar shot through the head and several dead dwarves. But what is it?! The players are thinking supernatural. However our resident super scientist started to take a look at the corpses of two of the dwarves. They had been blasted with some sort of energy weapon that exploded the tissues from the inside out!
What does this mean?! It means that someone or something has sent a time traveling hitman against the party. Our scientist went to the party with his findings. The party saw something making footprints across the snows of New Ashford. And watched as the face of what looked like an undead cyborg lit up for a moment. The players thought it was an E.D.D.I.E. unit ala Iron Maiden's 'Somewhere in Time' album. Now that cybernetic organism is after the party & they decided to take it away from the rest of New Ashford. And the party dived for the pylon gates! And now the party has entered into a 'cat & mouse game with the Deathlok unit. The party has no idea who or what is hunting them. And they don't really follow this blog. In actuality it's a Deathlok unit from the Time Variance Authority from Limbo. The party has broken several unspecificied time laws.And it looks like more may be broken before thier done.
The New Mavel Phile #38 Deathlok in the under the Marvel Phile category in Marvel Phile # 38 on the G Drive of the Marvel Super Heroes RPG: The Unofficial Canon Project. Once through the pylon gate the PC's found themselves on the New England coast where they were in a storm lashed sea side town! And then the zombies started to come out! Zombies from Jack O' Lantern's MSH blog with a write up on a horde of undead submariners!
And that's where we ended. The PC's are being hunted through time by a Deathlok unit & thier up to their eyeballs in undead sailors!
So back on December 14th there was a post on this blog about Thundarr The Barbarian available right here. And there's something bothering me about dropping the subject so let's get back to it.
The World of Thundarr Barbarian sourcebook has been an essential part of many a Gamma World 1st & 2nd edition campaign. And yes, obviously we've used Mutant Future as both a supplement & system to run 'The World of Thundarr The Barbarian with the sourcebook as campaign from N'york to the ruins of Disn'y. We've covered & crisscrossed the Wasted Lands of Merica. Let's talk about the 400 pound mutant gorilla in the room here that no one wants to mention. And that's the the Hyperborea Rpg All of the treasures, classes, etc within the Hyperborea are direct or indirect call backs & homages to the 'Thundarr The Barbarian' cartoon.
Now recently (as in this morning) my clutch of gamers were talking about the gem of Thundarr The Barbarian as a possible future campaign location. Yeah,yeah, I know add it to the pile of ideas that gets thrown around this blog. This idea has merit however on several fronts. Front one is the fact that in the original Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition Dungeon Master's Guide there are conversion guidelines. Then again Gamma World fourth edition is far closer to the damage guidelines of the Hyperborea rpg. How could such a campaign be done?! Quite easily actually. The 'Old Earth' setting is already baked into the background of Hyperborea. Switch around some of the details & that comet hurtling between the Earth & the Moon might be a piece of moon when Hyperborea was taken into space
So could Gamma Terra actually be Old Earth!? Anything is possible but given our gaming schedule as of late. There's lots of ideas that would have to be ironed out first!
Now let's pick this up where we left off on the blog the other day on the blog here. The player's PC's have meet the enemies of "Five Shall Be One" & brought the multi tribal mess of Greyhawk into a focussed series of united armies. Has Chaos been idle?! The answer is no because the Chaos worshipping Elves have been on the move & sacrificing various pawns & knights in their chess game on the chess board of Greyhawk.And this is because events of T1-4 Temple of Elemental Evil have already taken place! And the PC's have secured the Keep from B2 Keep on the Borderlands & put down the forces of the village of Hommlet.
And this proceeds the coming of the main event 'The Eye Opening!' Because this follows on the heels of AX5 Eyrie of the Dread Eye; " The Eye Is Opening."
"Thousands of years ago, living gods named Khepri wielded powers beyond understanding. Their bizarre magics rived a rent in reality itself. This portal—the Oculus—led to the deepest realms of Chthonic Darkness, but it was not yet fully open. Malign forces, opposed to all life, infested the Oculus, and waited. The Khepri kept vigil over the Oculus till time moved her hand. When the Khepri vanished in the Day Without Night, their Elven epigones took up the watch. In time, the Elves were conquered by the diabolic Thrassian race, and they in turn were subjugated by the Zaharans. Through the millennia, the caretakers of the Oculus studied, waited, and watched."
"Now the Awakening is near, the Spheres are coming into alignment, and the Oculus is beginning to open. The dark power is reaching out and for the first time in an age the Eyrie of the Dread Eye is accessible again. As the Eye opens, reality itself comes under further and further strain. And as rumors of a new valley containing an underground forgotten city filled with untold riches spread out from the Dark Wall, the Oculus continues to open ever wider. " That's right the living gods named Khepri are coming to call once again on Greyhawk! The events of T1 Village of Hommlet were only the start! The awakening of the Elemental Evil cult has lead to one of the other forces behind the cult the living gods named Khepri! These Khepri living gods are served by armies of sword wraiths so devoted to thier alien masters that even in undeath they continue to serve thier alien masters!
These two modules are key to keeping the borderlands secure & the PCs are by now witnin the 'conqueror' or 'king' level allowing them to take the leadership roles in the Greyhawk military that they were meant to be. And remember Greyhawk'sSuloisebarbarians are key to saving the Borderlands themselves. And PC's being a part of the marshalling of them is a key pivot point within this campaign. The return of the Khepri was hinted at within the AX2 The Secrets of the Nethercity & those were only some of the living god royals. AX5 is one of the main shows then in the Barbarian Warlords of Greyhawk campaign but it's not the only one!
Growing up Dungeons & Dragons was regarded at best a curse & at worst an activity that outsiders did. The renagade status suited myself & my friends. And lately with recent activities on Twitter events have gone in that direction once again. And so let's pick it up right from here on the blog. Looking over & speaking with my players as well friends Zothique was once again brought up. Rodney Mathews artwork was brought up again. And this British artist's artwork screams Zothique to people.
Rodney Mathews artwork used without permission. No copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
So looking over the various Castles & Crusades books in my collection the Castles & Crusades Classic Monsters book immediately jumps out at me. There are several reasons for this including the fact that Classic Monsters has a legacy of OGL Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Fiend Folio monsters within her covers.
The Fiend Folio monsters are a perfect fit for the millions & millions of years of future Earth of Zothique. The demon haunted jungles & forrests of Zothique have seen numerous species of alien animals & whatnot imported from across the planes & the stars. This fits with the hundreds or thousands of fallen kingdoms which have risen & fallen within the sands & wastes of this far future setting of Clark Ashton Smith. Monsters such as the Babbler, the blood worm, and a myriad of others fit the Sword & Sorcery asthetic of our version of Zothique. Perhaps no story really hits the ironic & deadly horrid nature of Zothique's shores such as 'The Isle of the Torturers'. Here an alien cosmic cycle comes to an end & a brand new one begins. And this speaks volumes of the nature of the CAS setting itself. The ground littered with the remains of a once great empire in wreckage to forces of the universe indifferent to the pleas of mankind.
Yet this same univerese will be picked up by the survivors to begin again. And here is where the nations of the Zothique have room for the inovations of adventurers.
This is something we see time & again within Clark Ashton Smith's body of work. One cycle ending while another begins as the works of man build upon itself.. True of both the gods & mankind as one age ends & another begins. Things & relics left behind become the myths & legends of next inheritors of the titles of adventurer. The artwork of Fredrik Rahmqvist may have inspired Isle of the Torturer.
There's an almost but not quite Clive Barker almost Hellraiser like connection to the Uccastrog & we can see this in the description of the people of the isle;
"At this, the heart of Fulbra sank within him; for he had heard numerous tales of Uccastrog in bygone years; and the tales were not such as would reassure a stranded traveler. Uccastrog, which lay far to the east of Cyntrom, was commonly known as the Isle of the Torturers; and men said that all who landed upon it unaware, or were cast thither by the seas, were imprisoned by the inhabitants and were subjected later to unending curious tortures whose infliction formed the chief delight of these cruel beings. No man, it was rumored, had ever escaped from Uccastrog; but many had lingered for years in its dungeons and hellish torture chambers, kept alive for the pleasure of King Ildrac and his followers. Also, it was believed that the Torturers were great magicians who could raise mighty storms with their enchantments, and could cause vessels to be carried far from the maritime routes, and then fling them ashore upon Uccastrog."
The Uccastrog are strange & twisted as thier final fate hint at the peace of the Siver Death. But then what?! The whole of the lands of the Uccastrog become one huge crypt. And this too is now the perfect opportunity for a group of enterprising rogues & fools to brave the wraith of the Silver Death. But is it worth the risk?! Hard to say really. If the rain of the Silver Death is done then possibly. But what if the Silver Death is actually an elemental disease. A thing that can be spread person to person with little cure. Then said adventurers might be spreading the very thing that dooms their country or other adventurers could and it's up to them to find a cure if possible in this far future world.
The Castle Keepers Guide would be key here to run an expediation to ''The Isle of the Torturers'. Because of the nature of the Silver Death is a possible plague that can take out anyone who comes in contact with it. The Silver Death transforms the victim into a silvery elemental statue without a Save vs magic. A powerful remove curse or wish might save the victim. Treasure or relics taken from the victims must be cleansed.
