OSR Commentary & Sideskinning Sinful Whispers (Swords and Wizardry) By Tom Knauss From Frog God Games

 If you've been following the mods we've been doing let's dive right back into the mix and get with the idea the awakening of the Deep Ones goddess. But what if this kicks off other Lovecraftian  dieties agendas across the world?! We're going to assume that the player's PC's are  going to be at least fifth level after dealing with the adventure agendas in our last adventures. 

"They tell of a lonely island that bears Great Pele’s footprints. An isle seared by a mother’s vengeance for the evil wrought on Her eloved children –  and where gods smite the earth, only fools dare tread. On the Razor, ’tis folly, indeed, to walk any ground She condemned."

Squint & pretend that this says Swords & Wizardry 

"Yet still, mortals come. Legends of a secret magic hoard, the fate of a missing whaler, and the strange tale of a lone survivor beckon to shores grown as lush and inviting as a siren’t irresistible song."

"“This way”, encourages a sly whisper adrift on the wind. “Come, and I shall make you mine.” From ruins where once She trod in wrath, the temptations of an ageless evil speak after centuries of silence."

Sinful Whispers is a great way to pick up the pace on the surface world as the Deep One's influence whispers to the rest of the Lovecraftian  pantheon. The PC's here are on the surface world are drawn into the web of the Deep Ones. Ships begin to go missing, coastal towns disappear, and more oceanic related weirdness happens. 

Hannes Bok's illustrations for the publication of the story in the January 1942 issue of Weird Tales

Sinful Whispers assumes that the players PC's are at least fifth level & if we go back to the original Lovecraft story the Shadow over Innsmouth then we get the original source of the  corruption from the Deep Ones; "My back was toward the fishy-smelling sea, but he was facing it and something or other had caused his wandering gaze to light on the low, distant line of Devil Reef, then showing plainly and almost fascinatingly above the waves. The sight seemed to displease him, for he began a series of weak curses which ended in a confidential whisper and a knowing leer. He bent toward me, took hold of my coat lapel, and hissed out some hints that could not be mistaken,

"Thar's whar it all begun—that cursed place of all wickedness whar the deep water starts. Gate o' hell—sheer drop daown to a bottom no saoundin'-line kin tech. Ol' Cap'n Obed done it—him that faound aout more'n was good fer him in the Saouth Sea islands.

"Everybody was in a bad way them days. Trade fallin' off, mills losin' business—even the new ones—an' the best of our menfolks kilt aprivateerin' in the War of 1812 or lost with the Elizy brig an' the Ranger scow—both on 'em Gilman venters. Obed Marsh he had three ships afloat—brigantine Columby, brig Hefty, an' barque Sumatry Queen. He was the only one as kep' on with the East-Injy an' Pacific trade, though Esdras Martin's barkentine Malay Bride made a venter as late as twenty-eight.

"Never was nobody like Cap'n Obed—old limb o' Satan! Heh, heh! I kin mind him a-tellin' abaout furren parts, an' callin' all the folks stupid for goin' to Christian meetin' an' bearin' their burdns meek an' lowly. Says they'd orter git better gods like some o' the folks in the Injies—gods as ud bring 'em good fishin' in return for their sacrifices, an' ud reely answer folks's prayers.

"Matt Eliot his fust mate, talked a lot too, only he was again' folks's doin' any heathen things. Told abaout an island east of Othaheite whar they was a lot o' stone ruins older'n anybody knew anying abaout, kind o' like them on Ponape, in the Carolines, but with carven's of faces that looked like the big statues on Easter Island. Thar was a little volcanic island near thar, too, whar they was other ruins with diff'rent carvin'—ruins all wore away like they'd ben under the sea onct, an' with picters of awful monsters all over 'em."

Although rejected by the magazine during Lovecraft's lifetime, The Shadow over Innsmouth was reprinted in Weird Tales in 1942

Those ruins that are spoken of in 'The Shadow over Innsmouth' are perfectly aligned with the island of  'Sinful Whispers'. That island is perfect for dropping onto Hyperborea or the campaign setting of your choice.
But this is only the start of the war an opening salvo if you will. But why?! Well, pure human greed;""They had all kinds a' cities on the sea-bottom, an' this island was heaved up from thar. Seem they was some of the things alive in the stone buildin's when the island come up sudden to the surface. That's how the Kanakys got wind they was daown thar. Made sign-talk as soon as they got over bein' skeert, an' pieced up a bargain afore long.

"Them things liked human sacrifices. Had had 'em ages afore, but lost track o' the upper world after a time. What they done to the victims it ain't fer me to say, an' I guess Obed was'n't none too sharp abaout askin'. But it was all right with the heathens, because they'd ben havin' a hard time an' was desp'rate abaout everything. They give a sarten number o' young folks to the sea-things twice every year—May-Eve an' Hallawe'en—reg'lar as cud be. Also give some a' the carved knick-knacks they made. What the things agreed to give in return was plenty a' fish—they druv 'em in from all over the sea—an' a few gold like things naow an' then." 
This is only the start of it as more horror and danger start to surface across the world because the 'Drow' have been busy as well. 

Review & Commentary On Frog God Games 'The Fiend of Turlin' By Skeeter Green For Swords & Wizardry rpg or Your Old School Campaigns

 "It all seems like an ordinary city adventure at the beginning, in the Turlin’s Well District of the City of Bard’s Gate, but matters get darker and stranger as events move on. An unknown troublemaker is progressing from vandalism to kidnapping to murder, and the district’s civil order starts to come unraveled as the city watch remains helpless to stop the very visible crimes…" 

Frog God Games Skeeter Green has created a nice first or second level adventure in 'The Fiend of Turlin's Well'. A thiry page adventure that attempts & succeeds in adding in psychological horror into the the realm of Swords & Wizardry rpg's Sword & Sorcery adventure. 

The dark nature of the murders of this adventure are not for the faint of heart. 'The Fiend of Turlin'   adventure  set up is very itself very well with the PC's getting deeply into the middle of events right away. 'The Fiend of Turlin' takes the PC's deep into the adventures events & unfolds around them solidly. 
There is treasure but there's a lot of terror here and 'The Fiend of Turlin'  makes good use of both its plot & elements over multiple sessions if played correctly. Without giving a lot away there's enough within 'The Fiend of Turlin' to take the PC's from 1st level right into a healthy 2nd level easily. The writing is solid & the adventure moves along quickly.  This is an 'adult' adventure because of how it lays itself out & its disturbing content ( no more so then an episode of NCIS really or an 'R' rated film.  'The Fiend of Turlin' could be used to introduce PC's to a larger urban city scape campaign & it really would fit the grim & gritty nature of Greyhawk quite easily. 

'The Fiend of Turlin' By Skeeter Green For Swords & Wizardry rpg isn't a bad choice to kick off a low level Swords & Wizardry rpg campaign with a neo Noir  Sword & Sorcery slant! The NPC's are solid, the cartography good, and the material is easily adaptable. 

Frog God Games 'The Fiend of Turlin' By Skeeter Green For Swords & Wizardry rpg is available here! 

Friday Mail Call - Troll Lords & Frog God Games In The House!

 Jason Vey's Amazing Adventures fifth edition has been on my brain now for some days going into a Lovecraftian campaign coming up. Got to say that  its very different then let's say Fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons. 

Amazing Adventures handles the Pulp & Modern elements better then 5 edition. 

Horror has consequences in this game. 

AA can do D&D adventures without the bad issues of the fifth edition system. 

Thanks to the Frog God Games Humble bundle some months ago there's additional Lovecraftian material available to run with. 

 

And now onwards with the Frog God Games adventures! The gentleman who had to part with these was really upset after his wife approached me about buying them on the cheap! There's months & months of goodness here but its gonna be a question of working this stuff into the on going campaign! 

Review & Commentary On Matt Finch's 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal' from Frog God Games For Your Old School Campaigns

 

"For centuries, out in the wilderness beyond civilization's reach,

there has stood an enigmatic tower known as the Spire of Iron and

Crystal. It is a bizarre and ancient structure; four massive, eggshaped

crystals are mounted into a twisting, ornate structure of

rounded metal girders, one crystal at the top and the other three

mounted lower down. Moving lights seen inside the huge crystals

suggest that they are hollow and even inhabited, but no one has ever

discovered the secret of how to enter them. This is not surprising, for

the tower is located on a broad stone ledge halfway up a sheer cliff

face, the glassy walls of which have killed several adventurers who

attempted to climb down to the tower almost a hundred feet below.

Over the course of the last few months, with considerable effort and some

highly questionable methods, the adventurers have assembled quite a bit

of information about the Spire - things not widely known, even among

the wisest sages of the lands."

So right now Frog God's having this huge sale because of Black Friday. But its been a bit of Castles & Crusades that has our attention at the moment & yes Troll Lords has a huge sale on at the moment. But its an older title that has our attention today. Matt Finch's 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal' from Frog God Games is one of those adventures that's  been  sitting on the  hard drive for many years now. Its a nasty little romp of a dungeon for PC's levels 5-8. 

 This is one of those adventure that's gotten good reviews over the years from other corners of the OSR. But what the Hell were Frog God Games thinking with their own Drivethrurpg cover artwork. It does nothing for the module?! Yes we know its part of the 'one night stand' series but com'n on?! The director's cut artwork is so much better. Even Ten Foot Pole liked the 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal' & we almost never agree on anything. More over this is a really 'nice alien outpost on the edge of the wilderness dungeon'. 
I'm thinking of sticking 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal' into my version of a combined Carcosa/Cha'alt setting.
As Grognardia's review of 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal'  gets into the heart of the module; "The Spire of Iron and Crystal is a "pure" adventuring locale. Although there is a brief backstory about the korog and the original purpose of the Spire, very little of that comes into play unless the referee wishes it to do so. There are no essential encounters, boxed text describing your character's feelings about this eldritch place, or dramatic speeches by the Big Bad Evil Guy. What you get instead is an extremely well presented dungeon filled with weird magic and technology, clever traps, deadly monsters, and commensurate rewards. Yes, there's some great potential here for expansion. I can easily see using this module as the kick-off of an extended campaign involving the korog and their underground civilization, but, as written, the module makes no demand that the referee or the players be interested in such things. The Spire of Iron and Crystal is thus a fine modern example of the location-based approach to adventure design that gave birth to some of the best modules in D&D history." 

For me this is going to be a perfect set up because of the dungeon's alien nature & over all weirdness. Its hard to really review it without giving too much away! This a module that seems straight outta of the weirdness of Seventies original Dungeons & Dragons! 

The nice part is that I think  that 'The Spire of Iron & Crystal'  may work very well with both Castles & Crusades as well as Adventurer, Conqueror, King rpg. Already we' ve got plans for this dungeon to appear in a central part of the campaign axis so its gonna be a question of simply slotting it into the mix! And that's one of the best parts of a good old school module is the ability to slot it into an on going campaign. 

Blackness Rising - Bad Moons & OSR Lovecraftian Evil

Over the last two nights I've been going over Lamentations of the Flame Princess's Carcosa. I was an early adapter & advocate of Geoffry McCanney's campaign setting & vision. I grabbed my copy of Carcosa off the shelf last night. Its been a very long hard time since this tome has drawn me back to it. 



Carcosa & I have a very long drawn out history together. Once upon a time way back before the first Disney Marvel movies came out I ran a quite extensive Marvel/Carcosa crossover game that consumed two Summers back in '08 & '09. Lately I've been going over lots of notes for this campaign & familiarizing myself with the campaign. I watched a pretty extensive review of Carcosa on GrimJim's channel last night. Can't really say that I'm a fan of his, I love Machinations of the Space Princess rpg. But our rpg processes & rpg politic are way too far apart. 

The thing I took away from the review  was the Cha'alt/Carcosa as one whole planet bit?! Why $$# didn't I think of that? The rules for randomizing Hit Dice with every combat are quite bewildering & we never made use of them. While I can't really agree with Dungeons & Possums review of Carcosa there are some points in it. So out comes the Lovecraft's 'The Dream Quest of Kadath' & I begin brain storming.  


Anything from Carcosa is going to read as 'Chaos tainted' in my mind. I've made use of both Dark Albion & the  Lion & Dragon rpg when it comes to anything Carcosa &  Dreamlands. This goes back to several mini Dark Albion rpg campaigns. 



Its that Cha'alt/Carcosa Jack Kirby comic book vibe that goes back to my early OSR blog days in '08 and stumbling upon Giorgio Comolo's artwork. His artwork's inspiration 
 made that campaign extend way beyond the mini Summer campaign
it was supposed to be. 



So how does a  dungeon master get a heavily armed group of Carcosa cultists into their campaign?! Well I've gotten a bit sick of using Michael Moorcock's elements but let's go back to Lovecraft & one particularly nasty group of Lovecraftian monsters. The moonbeasts are prone to going to all kinds of worlds to sell their wares & slaves through their black ships. The ships are crewed by their hybrid turbaned slaves. Again this plugs into HP Lovecraft's 'The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath' where they first appear. 



Portuguese black carrack in Nagasaki, in the early 17th century
 are good stand in for the black ships of the moonbeasts. 

An extra moon rising over the upside down city of New York 1870 when the black galleons of the moonbeasts make port to sell rubies, moonwine, and rare wares. Meanwhile Carcosa & Cha'alt mercenaries, mutants, & marauders  make extensive off loading into the city. 



Now this is all going to tie into the extensive set up I've been doing all year with Frog God games 'Encephalon Gorgers on the Moon' Swords & Wizardry Edition adventure. 



The reason behind this is the extensive & harried history of the player's PCs with the brain lashers over the years. This is another nugget of weirdness that's slowly growing behind the scenes of my campaigns festering & bringing with it some real nastiness. 

Of Humble Bundles, Castles & Crusades, & Fishmen - OSR Campaign Commentary

When it comes to getting invested in table top OSR gaming its never been about the games but about the content. Troll Lord Games, Frog God Games, and many others have put together a solid bundle & its fifth edition books. Fifth Edition Dungeons,Mazes, & Barrows don't let the name fool you. This is a great little bundle. Here's the thing its a charity called the Book Industry Charitable (Binc) Foundation & its a charity that I believe in; "For more than twenty years, the Book Industry Charitable (Binc) Foundation has helped bookstore and comic book store employees and owners who encounter unexpected financial crises. The Binc Foundation works to keep book people in their homes, in their jobs, and with their families – stabilizing the brick and mortar bookstore community. The Foundation is the only 501(c)(3) in the country dedicated exclusively to strengthening the book industry by supporting the people who work in bookstores and comics shops. Since its inception, Binc has provided more than $7 million in financial assistance and scholarships to more than 7,800+ families. Support for the Foundation’s programs and services come from all sectors of the book industry. Imagined and built by booksellers, Binc proudly continues to be their safety net."  But there's a far more sinister reason for me grabbing this bundle & it has to do with my War 1870's campaign. I noticed that there's a very relentless sea theme running through many of these adventures from Frog God & co. 

Oh yes true gamers this all ties back into when I ran U1 - U3 The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh trilogy by Dave J. Browne, Don Turnbull as a Pulp or Victorious rpg campaign last year!


Now this follows closely on the heels of Ghosts of Saltmarsh with the alternative cover  which my wife had gotten me as a birthday present last year. 

Running U1 last year there were a lot of changes:

1. The alchemist was a lich of some very nasty abilities. 
2. There were Lovecraft ties through out this series of adventures. 
3. I ran this with a stripped down & very lean version of Castles & Crusades. 
4. This was a part of an over arching plot involving an alternative version of New York City & New England on a vastly different Earth. 

All of this tied into not having the Saltmarsh series be a 'Scooby Doo' adventure & instead part an over arching & vastly dangerous conspiracy involving Tegel Manor's Romp family. The smugglers of the sea ghost were not only very real & dangerous but strongly connected to the Slavers of the classic A0 -A4 Against The Slave Lords Series of adventures.

There's wheels within wheels folks here & they go across planes prime all over the place. But what does this have to do with the appearance of the rod of Orcus in my campaigns.

The d' Amberville Gambit - Campaign Session Commentary Report 1b - Now With More Jame M. Ward

So my Castles & Crusades rpg campaign has been humming along with me updating various adventure elements thanks in part to the Castles & Crusades rpg community on Facebook. I was able to get my local print shop to do an incredible bang up job on my recent purchases from Drivethrurpg.


So I've been incorporating huge swaths of past campaigns & that brings me to one of my most troublesome adventurer patrons & sometimes wizard foe  Stephen d' Amberville. Now d' Amberville first appeared in  X2: "Castle Amber (Chateau d' Amberville)" (1981), by Tom Moldvay. For the last twenty or so years he's appeared in the background of various campaigns as a high level wizard of near cosmic power. But for some time now I've been toying with the idea of him being completely converted into a Dark Lord ala Ravenloft.  But it feels like Ravenloft is way too well known at this point among players. Others have whispered 'The Haunted Highlands' but that setting deserves its own adventures really. But then a friend recommended James Ward's Tainted Lands . So it was on sale & so I thought why not I'm having it!


Since it came out I've been debating getting 'The Tainted Lands' since  2010 & it was Nicholas B's review that really sealed the deal; "Well, I just wrote a lengthy review that was devoured by rpgnow requiring me to sign in a second time (timed out I guess) and I lack the energy to rewrite this, so I'll just do a summary:
Style/Presentation: there are 5 books included but they are not indexed. The artwork is good, although the new artist's style took a bit of adjusting to get used to. As with all Troll Lords products it could have used a bit more editing. There is confusion on the extra prime rules introduced in the book.
Stand-Alone Usefulness: The book includes a C&C quickstart rules set but the game is clearly written for use with the main books, and so this is of limited usefulness. It works great as a specific campaign setting for C&C, but it is very high powered, and using much of this material in standard C&C games requires careful consideration.
Usefulness as a Horror Setting: This game is clearly inspired by Ravenloft, but it is much closer thematically to the movie Van Helsing or Underworld: Rise of the Lycans. I would also suggest this was a great resource for a Castlevania style game. Characters in this game are tough, very tough. They face slavering hordes of monsters that are just as tough, however; it's a strange mix that felt like a "fantasy heavy metal" take on horror to me.
Contents: Four new classes, a ton of new magic items, gear and spells, a detailed overview of the demiplane and a scenario for 4th level characters that will put them through the wringer of a haunted former keep turned inn turned bastion of EVIL. There is also a PDF with class-based character records and a quickstart rulebook that is more useful as a hand-out to players new to the whole RPG thing than to running the boxed set as is.
Overall: James Ward knows how to write a fun old-school sourcebook. It's not for people who find and crave balance, nor is it for people who learned everything they ever knew about role playing games within the last six years; if you were gaming in the 80's you will grokk what this set is about and appreciate what it's trying to accomplish. It;s very accessible and full of weird over-the-top ideas. Well worth the attention of old school and C&C fans alike. I could also see this being converted to a more modern game like Pathfinder with minor work involved. Fans of WoD games need not apply, this is a brand of heavy metal dark fantasy that has little to do with the precepts of the White Wolf brand names; likewise if you come to this expecting a Ravenloft supplement with the serial numbers filed off you will only be partially correct; the Tainted Lands is closer to James Ward's homebrew Ravenloft, I suspect, than anything else, and the higher overall power level of this game means it will most definitely play out like some sort of dark heroic fantasy than gothic horror.

You can't tell but this part is bursting with undead.

Style: 4/5 -- good art, good layout, needs some errata and editing Rules: 3/5 -- useful for its internal setting, harder to adapt a lot of it to a standard C&C game Readability: 5/5 -- James Ward's relaxed and casual style of writing is a pleasure to read and made this more engaging than many existing C&C modules Overall: 4/5 -- I'm using this for a Tainted Lands campaign "as is", the wacky concepts within make for a singularly unique over-the-top splatterfest campaign; if you like old-school and this sounds intriguing, grab it!"

Heavy Metal Old School Splatterfest sounds about right in my wheel house. And I've been debating about what do about the plane of water seas around my dimensionally travelling Tegel Manor. Matt Finch of Frog God Games happened to put me on the indegogo of Island of Sorrow is an adventure for characters levels 3-5 that takes them on a journey across the sea to rescue the lost scion of a wealthy merchant family. Yeah this sound right up my alley for adding it near X1 The Isle of Dread. Seriously this a perfect fit for it.

So over the next couple of days I'm working my coins into getting on board with this funding effort but its gonna be tight. Last night I remembered that  Timothy S. Brannan over at Otherside blog  had covered Tainted Lands in his  Class Struggles: Castles & Crusades Classes.
Here he speaks about modifying the Tainted Lands classes;
" Moving on to more C&C specific "worlds" we can first turn to the Tainted Lands. Now to be fair, I was pretty hard on this product when it came out.  I still find faults with it, but I am softening my approach some more.  I just ignore the "Psychic" and "Supernatural" attributes. The nice thing about this setting is it is easily back-adaptable to ad some darkness to your games.  The Tainted Lands also gives us four new classes.  The Witch Hunter (which I have converted to Wisdom), The Metals Master (which I honestly don't use), The Portal Keeper (I use Intelligence instead) and the Vampire (Strength).  Of these, I use the Witch Hunter the most.

The Haunted Highlands are next and have some classes that fit into the same horror or darkness tinged mode.  This includes the Players Guide, the Castle Keeper's Guide and the Black Libram of Naratus.  Now these books hit me right in my home.  Dark, scary, Celtic themed play?  Sign me up!  I will work on getting a full review out for the Haunted Highlands soon.  Case on point, the classes are a revised Assassin, a revised Monk, the Conjurer (Charisma based), the Necromancer (an Inteligence sub-class of the Wizard and which is also detailed at length in the Black Libram of Naratus), and the Witch (Wisdom based)! I could go on and on about the witch here, but it is a very approapriate adaptation of the concept for this setting.  Again. There is so much here to go through that I will have to devote a blog post or two about it.  But I would easily play one of these witches or necromancers."

This sounds very close to some of the Hammer horror Gothic/Gonzo feel that I was looking to inject into my Franco Prussian War Steampunk campaign using Mike Stewart's Victorious rpg as the spine system.  Across the demi planes the Cha'alt warlords & the Slavers are pushing their own agenda. There's lots of weirdness as wizards, dead gods, & others play three tiered planar chess with various realities. The Cha'alt crew wants to bring the whole chess board down or do they?! 

Stephen d' Amberville has been moving various agents into place at key critical junctures. A few of my players in Frog God Games  Encephalon Gorgers on the Moon have encountered the cat's paws of d' Amberville in the form of rival adventuring parties. A great adventure with a dangerous under plot to it.



For these modules I'm looking more at a Bruce Campbell Vs The Army of Darkness meets Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust hence my grabbing James Ward's Tainted Lands.

X2: "Castle Amber (Chateau d' Amberville)" awaits on its own to spring upon the PC's like some insane wild beast & bring them into its fetid grasp.
Meanwhile an old friend in the form of the lich the  Duke D' Lamont is keeping an eye on the PC's. He's sent the occasional assassin after the party of adventurers after they've broken into his tax collection coffers & caravans over the years. He's got a rivalry going with d' Amberville and often seems to squeeze them between these two bastard NPC's. 

In The Shadow of Tegel Manor - Play Session Report One

So we rolled in at about five A.M. & it was a great night of gaming! I'm using various incarnations of Tegel Manor including Frog God Games Tegel Manor. I cranked up the Gothic & Lovecraftian elements to eleven in last night's game.

Frog God Games old Tegel Manor kickstarter video. It really gets the manor's feel across!

A pirate ship anchored itself into the bay of Tegel village after making its way through the plane of water to this planar wandering Tegel Manor! One of our player's PC's followed a group of pirates escorting a VIP NPC up to the Bark & Byte to meet with one of the Houri troupe that was entertaining there. There was an exchange of gold for a small red vial of liquid. The VIP in question was a Prussian army general  in charge of the special projects division. He's got a deal going with the Slavers organization whose got some contraband from Cha'alt on board the pirate ship.


My world wary Prussian General inspired by
Gerhard Johann David von Scharnhorst  

One of the party got into a bar knuckles wrestling match with some farm hands & sailors in one of the abandoned houses around Tegel village. He won by the skin of his teeth & his second bout was even closer! But it was after the match that things got very weird & dangerous. The PC followed what looked like an ordinary couple into a small root cellar for a midnight randevu  it was anything but!
The PC crept into the darkness when something wasn't quite right. He got a glimpse of yellow stilted eyes in the darkness! Then two seconds later they vanished into the darkness. He found the sailor fast asleep & it too over fifteen minutes to roust him!? There were human foot prints on the soil that turned into strange but delicate dog like coyote tracks.
 

The party's bard meanwhile kept a close eye on the Prussian general inside the Bark & Bite tavern. Other members of the party kept the pirate ship in sight out on the bay. They are unaware of the Cha'alt mutant warlord aboard the pirate ship whose bounty hunters are even now scouring the countryside making their way towards Tegel Manor. Telepathically communicating with their boss aboard the pirate ship.



My mutant war lord was inspired by "A Barbary Pirate", Oil on canvas, 51 inches x 31.5 inches (129.5 x 80 cm) by Giovanni Guida (1837-1895). This piece has just the right amount of menace for Tegel Manor. 

The Cha'alt NPC mutant warlord was rolled up using the tables in Cha'alt & expanded upon with some of my home brew random tables. I'll be sharing those coming up! All in all it wasn't a bad game at all. Cha'alt definitely had its uses in last night's game.



I had a ton of fun adapting Castles & Crusade's Siege engine with the various OSR properties that I own. This campaign is gonna be great! All in all a good first session!
The manor continues its journey to 1870's Mexico next session. 

Back To The Manor Baby! Tegel Manor Session Zero Play Report

One of the ideas that's been kicking around my head has been using Castles & Crusades with the older 3.5 Ravenloft books but twisting it around Tegel Manor. But there's far more to my version of Tegel manor. But that could wait as we dive back into Tegel Manor's long & storied history in my OSR games. 

Sorry folks but I've been a wee bit absent for the last day & a half but campaign preparations have been made. Its back to the manor or in this case back to the original Judge's Guild  Tegel Manor or my campaign setting's  version of it. The time & space dimensional traveling version of Tegel Manor that's been terrorizing my players for more then 15 years now! Now with Castles & Crusades systems powering my games I feel that's its time to resurrect the manor & the machinations of the Rump family!



This coming Friday my players will be facing down a steam powered nightmare in all of its glory! Muhahaha! Its alive! The manor, its valley, & the surrounding land settings will be transported across history into the middle of an alternative Earth's Franco Prussian war right into the middle of the 1870's  battle zone!



Column of Prussian field artillery by the side of a road at Torcy in September 1870

What the Prussians don't know about is the PC's history with the house & its various appearances upon Venger Satanis's Isles of Purple Haunted Putrescence. The haunted house of horror will be appearing along the time line of one of the PC's NPCs brother's whose had interactions with  Tegel Manor.



There are two parties right now inside Tegel Manor & their up to their eye balls in the affairs of the Rumps. And things are about to heat up as mercenaries working for the Prussians begin to mettle in the affairs of Tegel Manor & the Rumps. All of this is going to bring the Hammer Horror & Victorious rpg  aspect of this campaign down on the heads of the players!

The Bare Bones of An Upcoming Adventure Using Castles & Crusades Classic Monsters book & Frog God Games Glades of Death

So I've been going through Castles & Crusades Classic Monsters book & setting up wilderness campaign encounters for an upcoming Victorious rpg campaign. Work has had me on the ropes for some time now but some how I've squeezed a few ideas into the campaign mix. The Classic Monster book basically has a rework of many of the Fiend Folio favorites in it Behirs and Boggarts cavefishers,  coffercorpses, demilichs, devil dogs, ear seekers and flumphs.  This has basically made me get off my butt & get in gear with some of the books in my other part of my collections.



I'm speaking about Frog God Games Glades of Death a three point five era  book but with some very interesting back pieces to the spine of it.
"From dreaded ghoul wolves to a battle between druids and insects to the forested demiplane of a mad druid and many more encounters, the forest is home to numerous mysteries and threats. Whether the focus of your PCs’ adventures or simply an interruption in their travels, adventure awaits in the wilderness!"
There are several reasons for this first of all this is a good 3.5 era Sword & Sorcery book. Hear me out here. The wilderness of this upcoming campaign needs a bit of extra kick & converting from 3.5 to Castles & Crusades isn't a big deal at all. 




This is an older Necromancer games title & it quietly cuts across many of the wilderness & wasteland ideas that I'm going to be applying for this campaign. The wilderness is a dangerous & very rife with black druid covens. So I'm bring back some of my 3.5 era campaign staples but bring them up to Castles & Crusades standards. Frog God Games Glades of Death isn't simply a set of rules, new character classes, etc. This is an ideas book & there's some great wilderness twists to it.

 But why the wilderness aspect? Because the upcoming hex crawl & dungeon is going to sprawl into the wilderness. Wilderness is a huge part of the tradition & play of classic Dungeons & Dragons. Just look at this blog piece from The Angry DM all the way back in 2015.  Read the comments at the end of the blog entry these are very insightful & there's some thoughtful opinions.
The encounter idea of a grove & coven of evil black druids using plant imbued remains of local prehistoric wildlife is a very scary proposition.  The characters confronted with such a reality vs the greater one looming on the horizon is gonna be a test of the viability of this campaign setting.


Animals depicted in rock art from the Les Combarelles cave are some of the dangerous prehistoric fauna that's going to be in the area of this up coming game. I'm being purposely vague on some campaign setting aspects.



François Guizot (1787-1874), The History of France from the Earliest Times to the Year 1789, London : S. Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1883, p. 103 is one of the main influences on this up coming game adventure.  There's some great ideas in the background of this history of France. It was actually the artwork about that inspired me to start working on this adventure. A dark druid coven has been operating in this back water of France for centuries after stumbling upon an ancient place of power in this case a dungeon. All sorts of mayhem has become a part of the local folklore. The local population has been enthralled to these evil bastards for centuries now.


Eleanor Hull, The Boys' Cuchulainn

The set up goes like this the PC's wander into a hex crawl area where the druid coven is operating & find out that human sacrifice is going on. But there's a looming greater evil baring down on them. Do they take out the locals or let greater evil overwhelm it? Will they deal with the dungeon powering the dark occult weirdness going on?
Right now this is the figment of a dungeon in the French countryside with lots of dangerous wilderness aspects to it.  I've really gotta flesh this adventure out far more before running it. 

Commentary & Review Of 'The City That Dripped Blood' Adventure For Swords & Wizardry by Steve Winter

"Temelpa, an ancient walled city on a forgotten trade route, thought to be abandoned ages ago, and now, the adventurers find themselves besieged within. 

Unable to leave their refuge, the adventurers will quickly discover the city is inhabited, not deserted as initially believed, by an ancient society. They will soon be embroiled in the affairs of a twisted caste system built on servitude and cannibalism and headed by an inter-dimensional vampiric overlord.

This open-ended adventure allows the GM to unleash an array of unique monsters, factional power struggles, and intriguing plots upon the characters as they fight and scheme to stay alive, entrapped in a hostile city where they are viewed as useful pawns or a tasty exotic meal.

Can the characters hold out until the siege is broken and escape with their lives? Will they champion the cause of the downtrodden and upend the social order? Or will they be the main course for the next cannibalistic feast?

Welcome to the City!"

So I was looking for a good Sword & Sorcery adventure that I could port over to my OSR campaigns. Last night I came across 'The City That Dripped Blood' by Steve Winter  for  the Swords & Wizardry retroclone but easily adaptable to other OSR systems. This adventure could be completely ported over to Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea or Castles & Crusades. 
This is a short but solid adventure clocking in at twenty three pages of factional blood chilling terror. The dungeon master is going to have to be careful not to wipe the party out! Pay attention to the level cap on the adventure because your going to need five & above level adventurers to handle the Sword & Sorcery come down that echoes in on your players.
The wise dungeon master would look to John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct Thirteen for inspiration for running 'The City That Dripped Blood'. The PC's are going to get involved in the factional wars of the city of Temelpa. Extraplanar vulture-men  skelzis became vampiric with the help of the magical blood orchid of the area. With the help of their weredactyl servants rule over the forgotten desert city of Temelpa. The human resistance is in dire need of adventurers & the party can get themselves into deep trouble ala  John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct Thirteen

'The City That Dripped Blood' could become a tight & deadly campaign starter with the right group of players. The DM can adjust the monster action & encounters in  Temelpa as they need it. The whole of  cloth of the NPC inter-dimensional vampiric overlord could be used as a reaccuring threat to the party for a mini campaign for quite sometime. 'The City That Dripped Blood' by Steve Winter feels like a good & solid effort by Frog God games. The whole affair & cloth of 'The City That Dripped Blood' by Steve Winter  feels like a great starter for a long term campaign. And this is where I think its strength lies. The cartography & writing are snappy, the zip along & get the adventurers into the thick of the affair of violence & black magic horror  in in Temelpa.
For Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea this is the perfect adventure to continue on right after the events of 'The Anthropophagi of Xambaala' by Corey R. Walden. The PC's start in Xambaala. The events of 'The Anthropophagi of Xambaala' unfold & then the PC's  embroil themselves into 'The City That Dripped Blood'.
"Furtive and odious tales circle through various Hyperborean ports of call. Rumours whisper of an ancient occult city, Xambaala, clinging to the edge of the Zakath Desert. Perhaps the hideous horrors said to assail the city in the darkest hours are exaggerated. Maybe too another explanation can be found for the foreigners who are said to have disappeared to some uncanny fate. But the whispering tongues also hint that gold glints in the shadows of Xambaala, ready to be taken by the bold."



Later on they can face down The Beasts of Kraggoth Manor by Tim Callahan  why? Because the party learns that  the NPC inter-dimensional vampiric overlord from 'The City That Dripped Blood' has ties to the desert ruin house & its dungeons. This is the strength of the  'The City That Dripped Blood'. Its adaptable & easy to integrate into existing campaigns. This is the strength of a good mid level module for an old school or OSR campaign. But I've got a lot of criticisms of 'The City That Dripped Blood':

1. One this module needs a bit more exposition with the whole Temelpa's history & background. 
2. The district's descriptions need far more Sword & Sorcery punch to them. 
3. 'The City That Dripped Blood' needs far better organization of its contents as a whole & more adventure meat on the bones. I was expecting more treasures for the player's PC's that the life blood of experience points. 
4. The DM is going to have to work to adapt 'The City That Dripped Blood' for their home campaign as a kick ass Robert E. Howard type of adventure. This is a mid level adventure & needs the kick to rate it up to a four star. 
5. The module's premise doesn't live up to the actual product unfortunately. 
6. With a shove of a good editor & journeyman this module could be easily integrated into "The Lost City" (1982) by Tom Moldvay easily. 

'The City That Dripped Blood' can easily be turned into a kick ass campaign but its gonna take a bit of work. A three outta of five star module that could have been four or five.

'The City That Dripped Blood' by Steve Winter  is available right here. 

Campaign Commentary - Gods, Monsters, Demons & More With An OSR Twist

Today has not been a good day & apparently I'm supposed to be upset about it. I'm not at all. Instead over the weekend I was stuck doing repair work & trying to make the best of it. So instead I was doing reading, research, & reaching into the stacks here at Casa De Fabiaschi. Mostly I'm doing this for my Godbound rpg setting that I've been working on. I stumbled upon two very good OSR blogs for good for different reasons. Bob Something's blog The Ametuer Dungeoneers has a ton of great OSR & Godbound resources. The second blog  that I've looked at was Tales From the Thief of Whispers & man there are some excellent adventure ideas, monster conversions, etc. Really killer stuff on a whole other level of OSR goodness. In the meantime I've been looking through & flipping through my copy Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition's Deities & Demigods.



I'd recommend buying a copy from Drivethrurpg but that copy doesn't have the Lovecraftian Mythos & Elric pantheons in it. There are several patheons that I'm looking forward to using in this upcoming game campaign. One of the things I started thinking about is how the Elric patheon is put together in the book especially Arioch. Arioch is everything about the Meliborean's decidence & excess rolled into one rather nasty diety from the Moorcock's Multiverse Wikia; "Arioch, Lord of the Seven Darks, Knight of the Swords, Lord of the Higher Hell, et cetera, is one of the most powerful Dukes of Hell.

Arioch is the patron of Melniboné and has a personal relationship with Elric, who was the first emperor to summon him to the plane of Earth in a long time. He is sophisticated and highly intelligent, though possibly insane, and he usually (but certainly not always) appears in as an amazingly beautiful youth, usually with blonde hair.

Arioch is one of the three Sword Rulers along with Xiombarg and Mabelode.

Lord Jagged, a Denizen of the End of Time, once took the form of Arioch to manipulate Elric. It is implied that Jagged and Arioch may be one and the same."

Jeff Dee artwork used without permission 

 He's the appitimy of a parasite god feeding on the souls, society, past & future of the Melnibonéan race. He's one of the god damn Sword Rulers whose earned every idota of the Choatic evil alignment. There's a very good thread called Copying over AD&D Creatures for Godbound. 
Now I spent a good chunk of my weekend going over White Wolf games Exalted Rpg first & second edition. Jesus what a hot mess of a couple of table top rpg  systems they were. Let me grab the Rpg.net review qoute here (even though I can't stand the site, it does summerize my feelings about both editions of Exalted); "Basically, Exalted is a good game well-presented, with a number of minor-ish flaws which could be fixed, and a serious omission in the shape of the antagonists chapter. It’s crunchy and high fantasy and as such won’t interest you if you’re not interested in either of those things, but it does what it tries to do quite well."

 

Yes, I do think that there's plenty of stuff in there worth saving but its gonna take a clever dungeon master time & a bit of effort. But let me go on record as saying that I think that the Exalted were a bunch of complete & utter bastards who should have been hunted down to a man & woman. You may have noticed a copy of Scion in there from White Wolf Games as well & its also a terrible hot mess. Fortunely, someone else also saw this & went to do a ton of work on the game for me. But,but what about Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea surely your not giving up on one of your favorite games. Not at all, notice I mentioned  the Melnibonéan race earlier. Well Clark Ashton Smith figures into this.. As Arioch as to the Melniboneans so too do we see the cycle of the Great Old Ones in Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborean cycle. These gods permetated every strata of the Hyperborean society, religion, and all their works;

• Coming of the White Worm, The (1941)
• Door to Saturn, The (1932)
• House of Haon-Dor, The (1989)
• Ice-Demon, The (1933)
• Lament for Vixeela (1953)
• Muse of Hyperborea, The (1929)
• Seven Geases, The (1934)
• Tale of Satampra Zeiros, The (1931)
• Testament of Athammaus, The (1932)
• Theft of the Thirty-Nine Girdles, The (1958)
• Ubbo-Sathla (1933)
• Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan, The (1932)
• White Sybil, The (1932)

And this brings me to the OSR  Humble Bundle which is currently being offered on thier website. At first there doesn't seem to be anything in common with what we've been talking about but that's where your dead wrong.

Crypt of the Science Wizard,Creeping Cold & many of the AS&SH adventures are exactly the sort of  ending of cycles of life & creation that I've been talking about. Each of these marks a point in the history of their campaign setting where divinity & heroism is needed so that destruction & evil don't take the human or near human race down. Not only can the modules & adventure offerings from Troll Lord Games & North Wind Adventures be converted over to Godbound. But they can be used to punch the players in the face with the fact that all races & seasons have their time including gods. Actually especially gods!