OSR Commentary On "The Savage Sword of Conan As OSR Campaign or Adventure Resource

So its Nineteen Seventy Four & I'm four years old digging though my favorite uncle's stash of comics & comic magazines. I spy a new one he's just gotten & he waves me off of it. We're talking about The Savage Sword of Conan Curtis imprint.

"The Savage Sword of Conan was a black-and-white magazine-format comic book series published beginning in 1974 by Curtis Magazines, an imprint of American company Marvel Comics, and then later by Marvel itself. Savage Sword of Conan starred Robert E. Howard's most famous creation, Conan the Barbarian, and has the distinction of being the longest-surviving title of the short-lived Curtis imprint."

This is one of the most iconic & cultastic comic magazine titles that stayed on my comic shop pull box & it hardly ever disappointed;
"As a "magazine", Savage Sword of Conan did not have to conform to the Comics Code Authority, making it a publication of choice for many illustrators. It soon became one of the most popular comic series of the 1970s and is now considered a cult classic. Roy Thomas was the editor and primary writer for the series' first few years (until issue 60), which featured art by illustrators such as Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Barry Windsor-Smith, John Buscema, Alfredo Alcala, Jim Starlin, Al Milgrom, Pablo Marcos, and Walter Simonson. Painted covers were provided by such artists as Earl Norem, Bob Larkin, and Joe Jusko."
 It was nasty, lusty, & had Sword & Sorcery action in spades & it was fantastic fodder for a fledgling dungeon master to bring the players to the table.  This wasn't simply a magazine but a great resource for a budding dungeon master.
It was also some of the first exposure that I had to H.P. Lovecraft & Clark Ashton Smith's mythos.

" The cover of issue #5 sports a Boris Vallejo painting of Conan being crucified, from the story "A Witch Shall Be Born". This story features Conan at his most resilient, surviving a desert crucifixion to get revenge on the man who put him there."

This was Conan at his most resilient & dangerous, Sword taught me a lot about how PC's should be put in danger & the lengths that they'd go to to gain revenge on NPC villains. These were stories straight out of the back bone  of various eras of Conan's life & it gave a formula for writing adventures that could take place in various eras of a PC's life. This meant that a dungeon master wasn't restricted to linear game play.
This was a trick that I've used time & again to pin ball levels & eras suiting play around the players rather then the adventure.

"The adventures in Savage Sword of Conan are not always consecutive (as they are in the color Marvel title Conan the Barbarian), and they cover different eras of Conan's life. The Savage Sword stories mostly feature an older Conan, and adapt R. E. Howard stories and pastiches starting from "Black Colossus" (according to the Miller/Clark chronology), thus following the Roy Thomas stories in Conan the Barbarian."
Everything in The Savage Sword of Conan is keyed to the interactions being grand gestures of Sword & Sorcery. Conan is a driven inhuman being of incredible acts of both bravery & savagery. There's plenty of dungeon crawling within these books & Marvel provided lots of T&A or implied it I should say.



The Savage Sword of Conan was a magazine that took lots of riskier from the moment that it broke on the scene & it was a comics magazine that didn't pull punches with its audience. Treasures were recovered but frequently lost to the gambling of Conan. There was also lots & lots of violence on the bad guys. Savage was relentless on Conan's war on the bad guys. His never give up or surrender could infuriating for some readers but this was from a very different time period.

For old school adventure design there was a definitive old school Sword & Sorcery  formula for the writing:

1. Conan would go to great lengths for revenge and this could dove tail in with the on going soap opera of NPC's in a the mix 
2. Various ruins often hold secrets form an unknown age. Make sure player's saga is played out on the field 
3. Adventure plot hooks connect in early in these adventures to take sure advantage of the soap like mix of adventure ideas '
4. Adventure have to be really tight and this comes across in the Robert Howard 's fiction. Marvel Sword sometimes players fast & loose with the Conan mythos but not their own internal consistence. 
5. NPC villains often moved in the background of the adventures only to be revealed later on in the story line. 
6. Rage fueled much of the Conan stories in particular 
7. Monsters are either one offs or the ancient remains of something drawing from the planet's ancient past 
8. Magick is dangerous & highly unpredictable. 
9. Corruption & Chaos were the products of the Outer Dark and should never be taken lightly. 
10. Adventures always had lots of fall out that might take months to resolve

The Savage Sword of Conan is trade marked & copyrighted to its respective copyright & trade mark holders. This blog post is not an attempt to violate the respective copyright & trade marks of the The Savage Sword of Conan. This blog post is for educational & entertainment purposes only.

More Operatic Campaign Design Memories & Commentary With X13 Crown Of Ancient Glory by Stephen Bourne

So last night I was watching some 'Jonny Quest' episodes with my father on a Wednesday night, hey that's just how we roll in my family folks. But it got me thinking about X13 Crown of Ancient Glory which came out in '87. Crown of Ancient Glory is a weird little module, it gives a taste of ruler ship to PC's as a future taster for ruling your own kingdom in other words domain level play. Let me pull some of the background & quick history on this module from Wiki:"
Crown of Ancient Glory is an adventure module for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. It was published by TSR in 1987, and designed by Stephen Bourne. Its cover art is by Keith Parkinson, with interior art by Chris Miller and cartography by Dave S. LaForce. The module's associated code is X13 and its TSR product code is TSR 9218. This module was developed and intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons Expert Set and Companion Set rules."

The rule sets are the important part of this module, the adventure is for PC  levels seven through ten and that's where we need to start.
 

"You must find the long-lost heir to the kingdom and recover the Sonora Crown, the mystical device without which a king cannot be crowned. Standing in your way are traitors and spies from within and invaders from without the kingdom of Vestland. Time is running out! Can you save Vestland from disaster?"

In '87 my uncle had been running a full blown operatic style campaign centered around the gods, demi gods, and mythological elements of Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) by Wagner with equal parts Jack Kirby & a solid foundation of TSR's Saga mini game. Now we as players thought we were pretty hot stuff and had conquered everything Uncle John had cooked up for us kids but he was a sadistic bastard. He hadn't even begun to pull out the stops on us kids. For the Fall campaign there was another TSR mini game classic he'd kept under wraps all Summer.

For his Fall campaign we found ourselves fighting the forces of Ragnarok once again! No the bastard pulled out "The Viking Gods Minigame: The Gods vs. Chaos in Deadly Final Conflict" from 1982! I watched him purchase this game back in '82 down at War & Pieces in West Hartford & suddenly this was going to become our party's downfall!  I'd read the back panel and my heart sank like a stone.

"Odin, Chief of the norse gods, broods in his great hall Valhalla and prepares for battle. As time grows short, his warrior maidens, the Valkyrie, bring him noble Norse warriors who have died bravely in battle. Here the chosen warriors will feast and fight, training for Ragnarok — the final battle of the Gods.
On that day, the evil god Loki will lead an army of fire giants, and huge monsters against the Norse gods and their human allies. The earth will shake as the greatest battle begins.
Lead the Norse gods in their defense of the Tree of Life, or storm across the Rainbow Bridge in search of final victory. Which side will YOU command in this exciting game of Ragnarok?"



So how does all of this tie into the background of Crown of Ancient Glory? Each of the powers, kingdoms, etc  from the module are aligned with the ancient powers of Norse mythology and events from the Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) which impacts on the over all outcome of the module in a very operatic fashion. PC's died in flights of operatic violence and heroic death. Did I mention that we listened to the opera several times during the fall and took trips to a local museum.

There were several things that this Fall's campaign taught me:

1. The module or adventure is always modified to the needs and expectations of the players but not necessarily what they're going to get. Many DM's twist & play with player expectation. Sure we were powerful PC bad asses but when we as PC's were messing around in mortal business we had to possess a human suit.
2.  More power brought more headaches and puzzles to play on the players minds. 
3. Operatic means that like the operas of old PC's familial ties are going tie tragically. Sure these are NPC ties but like in operas they can go down and provide the DM a revenge plot hook later on. 
4. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.  There are all kinds of headaches that DM's can inflict whist the PC is trying on the 'big chair' ala Star Trek this gives some very interesting latitude. 
5. Mythology is filled with weird and unknown monsters don't be afraid to pull out some weird, dangerous, etc. that isn't in the AD&D 1st edition Monster Manual, Monster Manual II, or The Fiend Folio. Mythology is the mother of chaos 
6. Glorious death can be fun if its for a heroic purpose. 
7. Give PC's kingdoms if they've earned it and want to A.Retire their PC's or B. They want to actually provide a safe harbor for the rest of the party. Yes this actually came up during play. 
8. Sword & Sorcery is operatic and more then slightly melodramatic so its alright to go over the top with the violence, action, and magic! 
9.  The kingdoms of Vestland &  the Ethengar Khanate are always going to be forever at odds, the holy Sonora Crown has been stolen can be & should be fleshed out as the DM sees fit. Again this ties back into the mythological aspect. Artifacts & relics are always a headache. 
10. Leave yourself several leads as a DM to continue the campaign. Don't wrap each & every damn adventure hook up in a neat little bow  
11. Deities & Demigods is an essential book for pulling this sort of a campaign off. All of the major players is in there.
    
    
    Here's where my uncle did a bit of shuffling around of using actual historical stand ins for the various module locations  from Ruthin Monastery, to the Red Fangs the lost isles, to Seaforth Tower, & Narvendul and more. This made us go through lots of old history books to find clues to certain battles in England, Norway, Wales, etc. I'm beginning to see a pattern to '87's Fall campaign.  We ended up with an isolated kingdom ruled by Ricky one of our warriors but this was a hard slog of a Fall campaign adventure. Winter was a whole other matter as the force of Hel began to pump up her efforts but that's another blog entry.
    

OSR Commentary On "The Savage Sword of Conan As OSR Campaign or Adventure Resource

So its Nineteen Seventy Four & I'm four years old digging though my favorite uncle's stash of comics & comic magazines. I spy a new one he's just gotten & he waves me off of it. We're talking about The Savage Sword of Conan Curtis imprint.

"The Savage Sword of Conan was a black-and-white magazine-format comic book series published beginning in 1974 by Curtis Magazines, an imprint of American company Marvel Comics, and then later by Marvel itself. Savage Sword of Conan starred Robert E. Howard's most famous creation, Conan the Barbarian, and has the distinction of being the longest-surviving title of the short-lived Curtis imprint."

This is one of the most iconic & cultastic comic magazine titles that stayed on my comic shop pull box & it hardly ever disappointed;
"As a "magazine", Savage Sword of Conan did not have to conform to the Comics Code Authority, making it a publication of choice for many illustrators. It soon became one of the most popular comic series of the 1970s and is now considered a cult classic. Roy Thomas was the editor and primary writer for the series' first few years (until issue 60), which featured art by illustrators such as Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Barry Windsor-Smith, John Buscema, Alfredo Alcala, Jim Starlin, Al Milgrom, Pablo Marcos, and Walter Simonson. Painted covers were provided by such artists as Earl Norem, Bob Larkin, and Joe Jusko."
 It was nasty, lusty, & had Sword & Sorcery action in spades & it was fantastic fodder for a fledgling dungeon master to bring the players to the table.  This wasn't simply a magazine but a great resource for a budding dungeon master.
It was also some of the first exposure that I had to H.P. Lovecraft & Clark Ashton Smith's mythos.

" The cover of issue #5 sports a Boris Vallejo painting of Conan being crucified, from the story "A Witch Shall Be Born". This story features Conan at his most resilient, surviving a desert crucifixion to get revenge on the man who put him there."

This was Conan at his most resilient & dangerous, Sword taught me a lot about how PC's should be put in danger & the lengths that they'd go to to gain revenge on NPC villains. These were stories straight out of the back bone  of various eras of Conan's life & it gave a formula for writing adventures that could take place in various eras of a PC's life. This meant that a dungeon master wasn't restricted to linear game play.
This was a trick that I've used time & again to pin ball levels & eras suiting play around the players rather then the adventure.

"The adventures in Savage Sword of Conan are not always consecutive (as they are in the color Marvel title Conan the Barbarian), and they cover different eras of Conan's life. The Savage Sword stories mostly feature an older Conan, and adapt R. E. Howard stories and pastiches starting from "Black Colossus" (according to the Miller/Clark chronology), thus following the Roy Thomas stories in Conan the Barbarian."
Everything in The Savage Sword of Conan is keyed to the interactions being grand gestures of Sword & Sorcery. Conan is a driven inhuman being of incredible acts of both bravery & savagery. There's plenty of dungeon crawling within these books & Marvel provided lots of T&A or implied it I should say.



The Savage Sword of Conan was a magazine that took lots of riskier from the moment that it broke on the scene & it was a comics magazine that didn't pull punches with its audience. Treasures were recovered but frequently lost to the gambling of Conan. There was also lots & lots of violence on the bad guys. Savage was relentless on Conan's war on the bad guys. His never give up or surrender could infuriating for some readers but this was from a very different time period.

For old school adventure design there was a definitive old school Sword & Sorcery  formula for the writing:

1. Conan would go to great lengths for revenge and this could dove tail in with the on going soap opera of NPC's in a the mix 
2. Various ruins often hold secrets form an unknown age. Make sure player's saga is played out on the field 
3. Adventure plot hooks connect in early in these adventures to take sure advantage of the soap like mix of adventure ideas '
4. Adventure have to be really tight and this comes across in the Robert Howard 's fiction. Marvel Sword sometimes players fast & loose with the Conan mythos but not their own internal consistence. 
5. NPC villains often moved in the background of the adventures only to be revealed later on in the story line. 
6. Rage fueled much of the Conan stories in particular 
7. Monsters are either one offs or the ancient remains of something drawing from the planet's ancient past 
8. Magick is dangerous & highly unpredictable. 
9. Corruption & Chaos were the products of the Outer Dark and should never be taken lightly. 
10. Adventures always had lots of fall out that might take months to resolve

The Savage Sword of Conan is trade marked & copyrighted to its respective copyright & trade mark holders. This blog post is not an attempt to violate the respective copyright & trade marks of the The Savage Sword of Conan. This blog post is for educational & entertainment purposes only.

More Operatic Campaign Design Memories & Commentary With X13 Crown Of Ancient Glory by Stephen Bourne

So last night I was watching some 'Jonny Quest' episodes with my father on a Wednesday night, hey that's just how we roll in my family folks. But it got me thinking about Crown of Ancient Glory which came out in '87. Crown of Ancient Glory is a weird little module, it gives a taste of ruler ship to PC's as a future taster for ruling your own kingdom in other words domain level play. Let me pull some of the background & quick history on this module from Wiki:"
Crown of Ancient Glory is an adventure module for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. It was published by TSR in 1987, and designed by Stephen Bourne. Its cover art is by Keith Parkinson, with interior art by Chris Miller and cartography by Dave S. LaForce. The module's associated code is X13 and its TSR product code is TSR 9218. This module was developed and intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons Expert Set and Companion Set rules."

The rule sets are the important part of this module, the adventure is for PC  levels seven through ten and that's where we need to start.
 

"You must find the long-lost heir to the kingdom and recover the Sonora Crown, the mystical device without which a king cannot be crowned. Standing in your way are traitors and spies from within and invaders from without the kingdom of Vestland. Time is running out! Can you save Vestland from disaster?"

In '87 my uncle had been running a full blown operatic style campaign centered around the gods, demi gods, and mythological elements of Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) by Wagner with equal parts Jack Kirby & a solid foundation of TSR's Saga mini game. Now we as players thought we were pretty hot stuff and had conquered everything Uncle John had cooked up for us kids but he was a sadistic bastard. He hadn't even begun to pull out the stops on us kids. For the Fall campaign there was another TSR mini game classic he'd kept under wraps all Summer.

For his Fall campaign we found ourselves fighting the forces of Ragnarok once again! No the bastard pulled out "The Viking Gods Minigame: The Gods vs. Chaos in Deadly Final Conflict" from 1982! I watched him purchase this game back in '82 down at War & Pieces in West Hartford & suddenly this was going to become our party's downfall!  I'd read the back panel and my heart sank like a stone.

"Odin, Chief of the norse gods, broods in his great hall Valhalla and prepares for battle. As time grows short, his warrior maidens, the Valkyrie, bring him noble Norse warriors who have died bravely in battle. Here the chosen warriors will feast and fight, training for Ragnarok — the final battle of the Gods.
On that day, the evil god Loki will lead an army of fire giants, and huge monsters against the Norse gods and their human allies. The earth will shake as the greatest battle begins.
Lead the Norse gods in their defense of the Tree of Life, or storm across the Rainbow Bridge in search of final victory. Which side will YOU command in this exciting game of Ragnarok?"



So how does all of this tie into the background of Crown of Ancient Glory? Each of the powers, kingdoms, etc  from the module are aligned with the ancient powers of Norse mythology and events from the Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) which impacts on the over all outcome of the module in a very operatic fashion. PC's died in flights of operatic violence and heroic death. Did I mention that we listened to the opera several times during the fall and took trips to a local museum. 

There were several things that this Fall's campaign taught me:

1. The module or adventure is always modified to the needs and expectations of the players but not necessarily what they're going to get. Many DM's twist & play with player expectation. Sure we were powerful PC bad asses but when we as PC's were messing around in mortal business we had to possess a human suit.
2.  More power brought more headaches and puzzles to play on the players minds. 
3. Operatic means that like the operas of old PC's familial ties are going tie tragically. Sure these are NPC ties but like in operas they can go down and provide the DM a revenge plot hook later on. 
4. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.  There are all kinds of headaches that DM's can inflict whist the PC is trying on the 'big chair' ala Star Trek this gives some very interesting latitude. 
5. Mythology is filled with weird and unknown monsters don't be afraid to pull out some weird, dangerous, etc. that isn't in the AD&D 1st edition Monster Manual, Monster Manual II, or The Fiend Folio. Mythology is the mother of chaos 
6. Glorious death can be fun if its for a heroic purpose. 
7. Give PC's kingdoms if they've earned it and want to A.Retire their PC's or B. They want to actually provide a safe harbor for the rest of the party. Yes this actually came up during play. 
8. Sword & Sorcery is operatic and more then slightly melodramatic so its alright to go over the top with the violence, action, and magic! 
9.  The kingdoms of Vestland &  the Ethengar Khanate are always going to be forever at odds, the holy Sonora Crown has been stolen can be & should be fleshed out as the DM sees fit. Again this ties back into the mythological aspect. Artifacts & relics are always a headache. 
10. Leave yourself several leads as a DM to continue the campaign. Don't wrap each & every damn adventure hook up in a neat little bow  
11. Deities & Demigods is an essential book for pulling this sort of a campaign off. All of the major players is in there.
    
     
    Here's where my uncle did a bit of shuffling around of using actual historical stand ins for the various module locations  from Ruthin Monastery, to the Red Fangs the lost isles, to Seaforth Tower, & Narvendul and more. This made us go through lots of old history books to find clues to certain battles in England, Norway, Wales, etc. I'm beginning to see a pattern to '87's Fall campaign.  We ended up with an isolated kingdom ruled by Ricky one of our warriors but this was a hard slog of a Fall campaign adventure. Winter was a whole other matter as the force of Hel began to pump up her efforts but that's another blog entry.
    

OSR Commentary - Using Saga TSR's Age of Heroes Mini games For Operatic Campaign Design

Could one of TSR classic era's mini games be used for old school campaign construction? Yes it could! Sound the horns, grab your father's sword & armor, and come with me now down the dark halls of history to Nineteen Eighty!  For tonight we play Saga one of TSR's Mini games! Much of what follows has been referenced from Board Game Geek's entry on Saga.

So Steve a friend of mine blew into town with his brother & grabbed me for a beer along with a game of the classic TSR mini game Saga. Saga doesn't require a complicated story or background, your a hero of Norse mythology your trying gain glory so that your saga will be remembered by others. Essentially this is Norse mythology stripped down to the bone presented as a game of intrigue and play.

 So I got together last night with my buddy Steve for a beer & a classic TSR mini game of Saga from 1980 by Designer Steve Marsh  & Artist Bill Willingham. Its not a complicated game & it works on a number of levels. Solid play and its a nice turn around from the usual D&D tropes which it shares but uses in a different way. From the rule book;

  "Saga minigame recreates a mythical time period occuring sometime after the fall of Rome - the age of heroes and vikings! Each player takes a heroic figure and attempts to perform deeds that will generate enough glory to ensure that the hero's memory will live in the sagas composed after his or her death.

To gain glory, the heros slay monsters, accumulate treasure hoards, recruit lesser heroes ("jarls", or earls) as their companions, and establish kingdoms. The hero who gains the most glory is the one whose fame will live on in the sagas, while the others are doomed to be forgotten by posterity. Each player must be decisive and alert to grasp chances and avoid having other heroes gain glory at his or her expense."

There are quite a few things that Saga taught me about campaign management from last night's game surprisingly which was how to effectively and efficiently use your monsters, resources, & how adventure location can change or alter the flow of play especially for an old school game such as OD&D or AD&D first edition. This would be especially true of an epic or legendary game set within the Norse mythological world.
There was quite a bit going on in last night's game and between beers here's some of what I picked up during play. I was eliminated quite early and that's not surprising. I haven't played the game in ten to fifteen years easily.

Here are some of the adventure basics & game highlights that could easily be translated into adventure construction: 

• Game character betrayal creates ins for adventure opportunities. The idea is that your PC's get involved in a round robin of political intrigue involving one of the controlling political powers namely one of the player's factions. 
• Monsters can and should be one of the most dangerous things in play. The monsters in Saga can make or break your back making this an epic level adventure. 
• Sword & sorcery are things that happen within the bounds of Saga & can alter the flow of play. There was almost but not quite an Arthurian feel to some parts of last night's game. 

Saga could be used to create an epic campaign easily with little tears or fuss. Four players get together play a game or two. Someone records the results and then the dungeon master or masters map out the game in the setting world of Saga! Yeah this could work quite easily. I would say that Saga is tailor made for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition, OSRIC or any of the other AD&D style clones. The reason is how everything within Saga is geared for greater glory and the epic legends of almost but not quite a Deities & Demi Gods style game. Why because of the almost soap opera style betrayals and double dealing within the game. Players can and will be at each other's throats and this reflects the mythologies of the classic Norse or Operatic literature. I'm looking at you Ring of Nibelung here.


In point of fact Saga could be used to map out an entire Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) campaign or more importantly a Richard Wagner saga quite easily. How's that for a mini game that can fit in your pocket. Parties of adventurers are going to be on one side or the other of such a game and it would be epic and very dangerous! This is exactly the sort of thing that Deities & Demi Gods was designed for.


Factions become one of the essential elements in this sort of a game where the fate of the party is at stake and their playing in the realm of the gods and demi gods who are for all their power simply as much foils as the PC's are. This is the sort of game that could have some very dark and dire endings or something very mythological where the songs of the heroes are sung in Valhalla.

All together I got quite a bit to think about with my beer and a quick mini game of a classic. For now I hope you make your saves and keep em rolling!

Crawling Under A Broken Moon Issue 17 - Actual DCC Play Event! Into the Ruins of Seattle!

I received Crawling Under A Broken Moon Issue #17 via email about two days ago & haven't had a chance to review it. So when I got together with some friends this morning instead it was suggested that I actually run it. So I grabbed my copy of Dungeon Crawl Classics & headed over to a friend's house about six.
Bearing in mind that these folks are all experienced DCC players & dungeon masters.


I had just enough time to actually read through issue #17 which has at its core the theme of necromancy, the undead, and Seattle. Its an odd combination to say the least and so we decided to stick with the traditional DCC fantasy types for PC's to save on time. We rolled up any number of PC's and then ran them through a very quick fantasy funnel PC. A patron gathers the PC's for a favor to recover an artifact from the ruins of Seattle and we were off and running.
I had six players with the traditional mix of a fighter, a thief, a wizard, an elf, a cleric & a dwarf all ported into down town ruins. The theme of the crawl was survival, recovery, & dealing with the mutated & undead menace. This is some of what's in this issue:

• >The Necromancers of the Space Needle and the Land of the Reanimatronic Dead
• >NecroTech - wondrous items brought to you by cutting edge necromancy
• >The Wikinomicon - containing a pair of spells to die for
• >And a slew of new undead beasties to kill your players with
  
  This explanation from the Crawling Under The Broken Moon blog doesn't really do this issue justice for the sheer weirdness of the material presented as the PC's had to deal with another Seattle theme,coffee. There's a ton of weird references to the stuff & its entirely scattered throughout.

The PC's entered the ruins & ran smack into a trading post in the ruins of an old bus station, an active & very dangerous trading post run by necromancers & full of undead. In fact everything in this issue is support for the ruins of Seattle along with its history, residences, undead, necromancers you might end up doing jobs for and more. The PC almost ended up running afoul of the Grand Synod of the Astroliches, but retreated into the Skullbucks coffee shop run  by Gary the Skeletal Warrior & Krissie his ward. They picked up valuable information nearly bought when a necromancer took a dislike to them. So they headed over to the Undergrunge speak with a  Grunge Mummy artifact dealer. Several minor run ins with undead around the place meant some minor artifacts & alerted the locals that there were strangers in their midst. 



Everything seemed to be going well until one of the PC's pissed off a group of four Nexoskeletons which  are powered armor suits made with un-dead parts and this melee took a good portion of the evening as the PC's dodged, weaved and ran the hell away from these things making their way to Queequeg's Quoffee where they met with their artifact seller. All of this was after a tip from a necrotech dealer in  various weird necrotech artifacts which included Undead grafts,Necro-batteries, and Jaw bolters which one of the PC's was tempted by. 
Their artifact seller didn't have the item but he knew where it was and for a fee he'd tell em. Well they coughed up the dough and found out the orb of Isemy was located inside a former record store turned temple. The thing was guarded by  four Power Wights who fed on the energies of the orb. The dwarf and fighter bit the dust with some unlucky dice rolls against the power wights.
They had the orb but now they had to get to their exit point which was in the
Dead Woods.What they next had to deal with was the Parts Piles which are bunches of undead parts and body pieces scattered around. The cleric came in very handy here then they came across a undead R.A.T. which is a rodent of abnormal talent & size which had been attracted to the other dimensional portal's energies. An undead rat wasn't really all that interesting to the palettes of jaded dungeon masters turned players right? Well when this bastard breathed fire they sat up and took notice!
They fought the undead horror and then dived for the portal and ran home as fast as they could. The players weren't happy with this issue at all or some of the crazy necrotic mutational horrors of Seattle. Crawling Under A Broken Moon Issue #18  was the topic of the smoke break, the meal, and after play conference.
I strongly recommend that you grab this issue if your at all into undead in a post apocalyptic setting. Get It Here!

Blood,Fire, & The Importance of Campaign Feel During Adventure & Campaign Construction

Hoping that everyone's having a fantastic 2017, I've been doing quite a bit of contemplation of this upcoming Ancient & Accursed Terra campaign of mine using Adventurer, Conqueror, King & they're Guns of War rules. What I'm trying to go for is the feel of a Hammer pirate film such as The Pirates of Blood River but I want to dial back down the fire arms to the wheel lock era. 

So yeah that's one element of it and another is to mix in the usual sword & sorcery vibe of Robert Howard maybe with a bit of classic black powder B/X D&D  era weirdness combined with the  isolation of the original Aliens film. There are dragons here & PC's should and will be wary as death is around the corner. 

These are not so much rule choices but zeroing in on the flavor of B/X D&D that's going to work for your old school campaigns. I've said it before and will again there are as many flavors of D&D as their colours in the spectrum. Trying to decide what's going to work for your players & yourself is part of the battle. Then taking that material to construct adventurers around is part of the organic process of adventure construction. Its not rocket science but there a bit of an art to it that I've had to learn the hard way over the years. Here are some of the guidelines that have worked for me as a dungeon master over the years when constructing an adventure or a campaign setting:

1. Don't be afraid to experiment with different types of adventures but be sure to advertise exactly what type of adventure your going to be running to your players. 
2. Ask the players what it is that they want you to run & design around those parameters but don't be afraid to color outside of the lines. 
3. Adapt, fold, & mutilate published work to fit your campaign style not the other way around. Take classic D&D or AD&D first edition modules and use them as you the DM need to. Add or subtract monsters, encounters, ideas, and more as needed. 
4. Create your own finger prints on your setting. & don't worry what others think but your players. 
5. Your style may work for your but not others and that's alright. 
6. There are no rules but there are guidelines that can help you but its only a game. You can pick up or put it down anytime. 
7. All of human history is your toybox and don't be afraid to raid it with impunity.
   
   So what does this have to do with Dwimmermount? When the mega dungeon's doors opened it touches off all kinds of major weirdness across the face of Terra. Azoth flows and cosmic events begin to unfold across the globe.Because the megadungeon draws from pulp era inspirations like Abraham Merritt and Edgar Rice Burroughs, & many others there is a consistence to the backstory. But I'm more then happy to modify this setting as I need to. Gasp yes I said that more then happy to take a scalpel to James Maliszewski's baby if I need to. 

The sacred cow routine of AD&D & D&D goes out the window during the campaign construction phase. This is something that many folks seem to forget, these modules were made to be tinkered with and modified at the whim of the players and the DM. This is something that I've seen others observe doing research for this campaign coming up. 

Anyhow more coming up.
 Hope you have a good rest of your New Year holiday!
Cheers! 

OSR Adventure Encounter The Temple Of The Book - A Lamentations of the Flame Princess/ Astonishing Swords & Sorcerers of Hyperborea Mash Up

 Adventure Encounter  Set Up

& Construction

“There have been times when only a hair's-breadth has intervened betwixt myself and the seething devil-ridden world of madness; for the hideous knowledge, the horror- blackened memories which I have carried so long, were never meant to be borne by the human intellect. ”
― Clark Ashton Smith


   Today was a one rule book and one adventure kinda day, make no mistake about Lamentations of the Flame Princess its a Gothic horror game at its core.And so the challenge today was to take that one rulebook and create an adventure encounter around it for the Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea campaign. For three reasons, one to make sure I was up on the rules of the game, two to prove a point that the rule book is as much a game reference device and three to show that sword and sorcery has many pulpy angles to it. And what's with the Blind Dead fan book? We'll get to that in a moment.



First thing is about the Lamentations of the Flame Princess game, there is a ton of resources that the rule book brings to the table. This includes the fact that most often in many of the recent supplements real life history plays a part in the adventure or sourcebook. A great example of this 'No Salvation For Witches' which uses some real world history and a very dangerous series of encounters for the PC's. But what does this have to with our adventure construction example today? Well let's talk about, "The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon (Latin: Pauperes commilitones Christi Templique Salomonici), commonly known as the Knights Templar, the Order of Solomon's Temple (French: Ordre du Temple or Templiers) or simply as Templars, were among the wealthiest and most powerful of the Western Christian military orders^[4] and were prominent actors in Christian finance. The organisation existed for nearly two centuries during the Middle Ages."




No other group has been used in conspiracy theory, quasi reality archeology history television shows and horror movies. Specifically one of my all time favorites The Blind Dead series but the problem? Well one of my players who came to pick me arrived a bit early for my game this afternoon.

So is this going to be a problem? Because already our noisy player thinks he knows what's in store? Umm no I actually left these books out for that very purpose. All is not as it seems with our Templar connection. And what does this all have to do with Hyperborea?

  The Lost Temple Of The  Book
History & Background

The following is all fiction and the set up for the adventure during  The Battle of Hattin which took place on July 4, 1187, between the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem and the forces of the Kurdish Ayyubid sultan Salah ad-Din, known in the West as Saladin,certain artifacts and holy treasures were removed by the Templars and taken back to a small church  on the banks of Cyprus. Among these were the lost pages of the Greek text of the Necronomicon. This version contains a version of the summoning spell from the Lamentations of the Flame Princess game. One of the knights was examining the text and misspoke summoning something hideous beyond the ken of men.


The slaughter was hideous beyond mere words and the church upon its isolated little isle was removed from our local space time continuum until now. The church along with its occupants have recently surfaced upon the oceans of Hyperborea. A few gold coins and some other trinkets have washed up on some of the local shores and already adventurers are hearing the tales of the lost treasure and its mysterious temple.
So the set up is simple the knights are undead and their are other more horrific things waiting for a party of adventurers in the church. The place is cursed and exists outside of space and time. It will only be on Hyperborea for 1d20 days and the hours are ticking which any wizard can figure out by watching the skies for 1d10 minutes above the church.

So what's in the church is going to depend upon the size of the party of adventurers, there will be 1d10 zombie Templar knights. But there will also be at least 1d6 or more weird monsters all generated using the summoning spell from the  LotFP Rules & Magic Free Version. 

The challenge of course was to create this whole encounter using the one book from the ground up. What's behind the events here? I would suggest using the demon generator from No Salvation For Witches. The things in that book would give a party a run for their money.

So here's what I came up with for a random Treasure list for The Lost Temple. The temple encounter could also be used as a funnel for a Dungeon Crawl Classics game party set up as fishermen,or locals row out to the island.
1D20 Random Treasures of
The Lost Temple Of  The Book

1.   An Ivory statue of a goddess worth about 100 gold pieces 
2. A silver plate worth 60 gold pieces along with various other silver pieces 
3. A carved ivory chess set with an inlaid board worth about 100 gold pieces to the right collector 
4. unworn chain mail, sword, and shield  worth 70 gold pieces for they are very worn with blood and gore. 
5.  Semi precious stone carved vase worth 100 gold to the right collector 
6. A scroll of healing in a metal scroll case 
7. A rosary carved from amber worth 200 gold pieces 
8. Astrology charts and star maps worth 200 gold pieces with lots of details on Venus 
9. Scroll of Protection blood soaked and unused, sealed with a wax seal 
10. A +1 sword of the head of this church,embedded in a pew 
11. Gold wedding ring with a semi precious stone worth 120 gold pieces 
12. A unusual telescope like instrument worth 300 gold pieces to the right collector or wizard. 
13. Weird gold like wand capped with three triple silver bands worth 60 gold pieces to a wizard. 
14. 6 pieces of fist sized amber worth 200 gold pieces because of the clarity and jewelry potential 
15. A diary of a wizard in archaic Arabic with tons of sanity eroding diagrams and drawings. The thing is worth 600 gold pieces to the right wizard but certain knightly orders will kill the owner to take possession of this book. 
16. A human arm turned to silver with the bones sticking out of it. The thing is useful to certain demonic cults. They will kill or pay the owner handsomely determined by the DM 
17. An ivory cask containing twenty cards used in demon summoning.There are twelve cards missing but they are still worth 100 gold to the right collector or the person's life. 
18. A blood soaked ruby worth 70 gold 
19. A parchment of sorcererous  horror that will cause 1d4 points of damage to the fool holding it, this piece is made from dried demon skin contains a first level summoning spell. The thing is worth 300 gold pieces but it is cursed. 
20. The head of a knight has been turned into a mechanical treasure with emeralds and rubies for eyes. The thing is worth 400 gold pieces to a collector of demonic lore. 

Commentary On Adventure Construction For The Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea Rpg System

While everyone the other night had a fantastic time with the DCC/Crawling Under A Broken Moon game adventure they wanted to get back into a Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea Rpg game adventure night. So began a two hour conversation with my co dungeon master for an upcoming AH&SH game. So I took a look a bit of Mutant Future and Tim Snider's Thundarr The Barbarian source book for use with this upcoming event.


Given my group's predisposition toward post apocalyptic worlds the Thundarr connection was a natural progression especially given the implied post fantasy world of AS&SH Hyperborea. Realms of Crawling Chaos also from Goblinoid Games  helps lend a Lovecraftian flair to the proceedings.



My co dungeon master is looking to use this world as a fragment of the Old World and the PC's being travelers from Hyperborea. There are several options on the table and the AS&SH referee's book gives lots of options for world and adventure building.


From the organization to the preparation that goes into this sort of campaign I know what I'm in for, this book is set up for and dwells within a fine place within the Labyrinth Lord andLabyrinth Lord Advanced canon of retroclone books but the forbidden magick aspect of it puts this book squarely within the Realms of Crawling Chaos Goblinoid Games campaign style of world. I'm not displeased at all with that vibe for it fits other books like Carcosa as well making these books a sound economic investment for the DM trying to stretch every last dime like me. This makes this line up a perfect set up to create a mini campaign world and adventure setting. I was also looking into the Pay What You Want OSR PC Resource - Advanced Ape Class From Great Khan Games For Your Old School Campaign

With the release of Ape Victorious soon this game has lots of possibilities when combined with AS&AH but this is an option that will have to wait until the release of that game. For now I've got lots of OSR options to consider.




Here are ten quick off the cuff guidelines that work when I'm doing a bit of AS&SH adventure construction and creation. These are by no means that extensive or exhaustive:

1. Choose cross compatible OSR systems to save yourself time and headaches and while about 90% of retroclone systems are cross gamable  AS&SH is a good setting  solid base to hang your adventures within. 
2. Keep things moving and choose the time, place, and adventure elements that you want for your games. Try and avoid the rail roadie pit falls of traditional D&D style adventures. 
3. Pick and choose the sword and sorcery elements that you want and don't be afraid to take risks. 
4. Make sure that your players are on the same page as you are system wise, if your all on the same page it makes games go that much more smoothly. 
5. Don't be afraid to take traditional D&D elements and swap them out with AS&SH's Lovecraftian backgrounds. 
6. Take risks within reason and don't make the adventure about you, remember the PC's are the heroes and characters of legend. 
7. AS&SH is a post apocalyptic fantasy campaign with lots and lots of pulpy elements. Take full advantage of those during adventure construction.  Make Hyperborea your own setting the way you want.
8. Expect players to do the unexpected and roll with it. Adventures are constructed with guidelines and weirdness built into them. Let the players take you on the journey as much as the play. 
9. Pick and choose your areas of the game you want and don't be afraid to make it your own. Keep things moving and don't worry about things too damn much.
10. Maps are fantastic but don't be bound to any one vision keep your AS&SH games loose and they'll create themselves.