The Lands of Ara

Swamped!

2012-01-28T07:14:00.001-05:00

Apologies for the recent lapse in posting. This past week was the first week of a new teaching semester for me, and with two brand-new course preps, I have been positively swamped!

In quasi-related news, Spawn of Endra is away on the West Coast, preparing to defend his doctoral dissertation early next week. As you might imagine, he has been immersed in preparations for some weeks now.

So things are busy, and in such a way as to keep us both tied up away from the blog.

But never fear, dear readers, we shall return! I may even get another session report or two banged out this weekend -- maybe -- and I know that Spawn and I plan to hit the ground running on the Lands of Ara Compendium 2011 as soon as he successfully defends and returns to the East Coast. The Compendium, collecting gaming content from this blog from its inception in 2009 to the end of 2011, will be released as an exciting, art-filled, free pdf sometime in February.

Thanks for your patience in the interim.

Roscoe and Charlie command your obeisance.

Session 48: Let's Buy A Mine!

2012-01-14T11:25:00.002-05:00

This session took place Thursday 12/8/11 and starred PCs Innominus (Clr-6), Yor (Dwf-6), Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard-5), and Hazel (Ftr-4 / MU-4).* NPC Gorgo (Dwf-4, Innominus' follower) was also onboard this time.

The group began the session by assessing their long-term options and raising once again the subject of purchasing the Frigglestone Brothers' Mine outside Farn Junction. Innominus noted that moving operations to the Frigglestone Mine would put the party closer to Prince Arkus, who was currently attempting to cure the Dark Plague infesting Farn Junction, Minoch's largest city. And Yor astutely noted that the price of the mine might be extremely negotiable given the occurrence of the Farn Junction Plague.

So on the morning of Day 166 of their Arandish adventures, the party departed Arkus' Country Manor (leaving Grand Vizier Krock in charge) and headed into Fortinbras. It snowed lightly, as it would do steadily for the next three days. After making a few minor purchases in town,** the PCs set off along the northbound road toward Farn Junction, three days' journey. The trip was uneventful, and the party veered off west cross-country three miles short of the city walls. [Their route took them from Fortinbras, in hex 2116, northwest through hexes 2015 to 1916 to 1815.]

Some road chatter:

YOR: We could be walking into death.

INNOMINUS: We're always walking into death! So what?

YOR: Exactly.

They marched another half day uphill into the mountains, due west, reaching the Frigglestone Brothers Mine on the afternoon of Day 169 of their Arandish adventures.

The place was a bit run-down generally, there were signs of scuffle (even dried blood) around the front gates, and no one was in sight around the main gate nor around the two-story log-cabin style main office. Yor called out:

"Hey!"

To which there were two responses:

(1) Uphill and to the north, several hundred yards away, in what appeared to be a mine entrance a dwarfish-looking figure emerged out of the dark entrance and waved down at the party, and

(2) The main office door opened and a friendly, burly, middle-aged dwarf came out and greeted the party, introducing himself as Frake Frigglestone.

The party introduced themselves to Frake, and Yor identified himself as the dwarf interested in buying the mine. Frake reiterated that the mine had been closed down for several weeks, and that he and his remaining staff had been unsuccessful in solving the mystery of the three missing miners. Yor asked Frake some questions:

YOR: What would happen to you if this mine were to fail completely?

FRAKE: I would go to work for the Rockstone Mining Company, a day's travel further west -- I've had offers to work for them before.

YOR: Well, my friends and I could help you by taking this failing investment off your hands . . .

FRAKE: Hmm. . . .

INNOMINUS: Frake, what actually caused those disappearances? Was any strange, arcane, or out-of-the-ordinary stuff found near where the miners disappeared?

FRAKE: Now that you mention it . . . [yelling through office door] Warren!

WARREN: [a deep, grizzled voice from inside the office] Yes?

FRAKE: Who was the supervisor in the North Tunnel Operation the week of the disappearances?

WARREN: That would be Taggart. I heard he moved back in with some relations of his in Farn Junction after the mine closed.

This exchange concluded with Frake promising to track down the supervisor who had been around the day of the disappearances, and then suggesting that the party descend into the mine forthwith to meet up with Darvey, who was onsite at Yor's behest.

The PCs ascended the steep, rocky slope to the mine entrance, where they were greeted by a crusty, grey-bearded old dwarf named Hakler. Hakler, after complaining about how the Mining company would no longer let him go down into the mines with the work crews, led the party back to a mule-powered elevator and urged them onto it. They climbed aboard, Hakler whipped the mules, pulleys creaked, and the elevator descended.

They went down just over 200' to the bottom-most level of the mine. There they were greeted by Darvey and three other miners named Ron, Tolak, and Zarb. Innominus asked if Darvey smelled right (i.e., dwarven, alive, etc.) to Beastarr the Bobcat -- he did.

Davey and Co. led the party back hundreds of feet northwest down the tunnel, then due north down a 600' passage into what the miners called the "Satellite Chamber," now just a disused storeroom. The missing miners had vanished near here.

The various party members searched the Satellite Chamber, in time finding a small etching of three pips like this:

Calling upon Endra to help him detect magic and evil, Innominus learned that the triple etching was not magic in any way, but did radiate evil. Uncle Junkal was able to call upon his folkloric knowledge to identify the triple pips as the symbol of The Ghost Tribunal, a trio of malign spirits believed to roam the mountains of central Minoch.*** Local superstition had it that the Ghost Tribunal were, in life, powerful adventurers who died horribly at an evil wizard's tower, and now haunt the mountains, feeding on mortal people's souls.

Inspecting the north-south tunnel connecting the Satellite Chamber to the main area of the Frigglestone Mine, Innominus found, at a spot about 200' north of the main tunnel, traces of residual magical energy encircling the whole passage. This was the very spot where some of the missing miners' clothing was found. Innominus and Dak speculated that something had gated into the mine tunnel at this point, abducted the dwarven miners, and re-gated away.

Satisfied with these preliminary investigations, the party, plus Darvey and co., ascended the mule-elevator and exited the mine. Yor went immediately to Frake and offered him 3,000 gp for the Frigglestone Mine. With some help from the ever-persuasive Uncle Junkal, Yor was able to get him to accept the offer. The party thereby obtained the rights to the Frigglestone Silver Mine.

At about this point, Hazel's player arrived, and, spurred by Hazel's thirst for action, the group became eager for some blood and violence. So they headed north into the treacherous, snowy, monster-infested mountains of Minoch hoping some dangerous creature would attack them.

Within a couple of hours, they had their fight: four large, six-legged, reptilian creatures with long, barbed tails and tiger-like faces stalked out of the woods and swiftly attacked the party. Innominus cast prayer, the group all leaped into the fray, and shortly all the phase tigers lay butchered in the snow.

And that is where the session ended.
--
* Due to real-world obligations, Hazel's player joined us somewhat late in the session.
** Gorgo bought +1 Plate Mail from local Enchanters, and Uncle Junkal upgraded to +2 studded leather armor.
*** Semantics Note: Innominus' player mentioned during play that it seemed strange that the Ghost Tribunal was called a "tribunal" and not a "triumvirate" or the like. I assured him that the name is deliberate.

Session B-1: A Bargain Is Struck

2012-01-13T12:16:00.000-05:00

[Note: Following the campaign name first-letter designations mentioned here, I have numbered this session "B-1" to identify it as the first session of the Brockport Campaign.]

Session B-1 took place on 12/4/2011 and included five central participants, playing PCs Jarl Scuttlebeard (Dwarf-1), Thorgald Thorgaldsson (Cleric-1), Korvash (Fighter-1), Mathias (Thief-1), and Yohan (Fighter-1). A sixth player rolled an elf, Evelyn Rootfoot, then left shortly after the session began. I allowed the remaining players to keep the elf onboard as an NPC follower.

The party began their adventures together lost in a vast desert, one day's worth of water rations away from a slow death by dehydration. They had been traveling across the sands by night after their caravan was dispersed in a sandstorm three days past. Then, on the morning of their fourth day of wandering, they saw this:

Out of desperation for food and water they sought a means of egress to the buried step-pyramid they had discovered. Lo, there was an open doorway on one side. Mathias explored it and found that the door was held open by the skeletal remains of a large humanoid, roughly hobgoblin-sized.

Session B-1 Map. The lower left corner depicts a side cutaway view of the desert step-pyramid; the pyramid's entrance hallway is shown at the upper left corner.

Stepping over the skeleton, the group cautiously proceeded down the hall, and found a pressure plate in the floor, and an already-discharged crossbow trap at the end of the eastbound hallway section. Blocking the door to the outside world open behind them, they headed around the corner, and to the northern stone door. It opened easily, admitting the PCs into a large square chamber with three central bronze vertical cylinders. Each 6' diameter cylinder went floor-to-ceiling and had a bronze door on the north side. The PCs instantly started fooling with these, and found that the cylinders were vertical passageways with ladders leading up into the interior of the three statues atop the pyramid. They also led down to a messy looking storeroom below.

Korvash opened the left-hand cylinder door, and darts shot out from the north wall, hitting him.

After that, the PCs stood to the side of each cylinder door while opening it, a fortuitous strategy: nothing happened at the central door, but the right-hand one, when opened, triggered a floor trapdoor to open right in front of it.

Looking down through the opened trapdoor, the party saw the filthy storeroom below: debris littered the floor, though there were a few intact crates and barrels at the north side. Spending a moment to examine the place from above, Thorgald poked a lantern on a stick through the trapdoor hole. It is then that the group noticed some huge insect-like things hunched down in the debris of the storeroom; three in all. The PCs pulled out bows and shot the three giant insect-things to death from above. Then the archers remained up top, near the trapdoor, while the other party members descended the right-hand tube-ladder to the storeroom.

The storeroom contained lots of debris, and a few casks partially full of some kind of oil. Mathias took twenty minutes to gather the oil into one pot, and got about six flasks worth. Meanwhile, Jarl the dwarf checked out a long-disused forge in the room's southeast corner. He inspected the forge for signs of dwarven manufacture or runes, but found none. He did find, in the ashes of the forge, a golden mask, depicting the face of the old man also represented on one of the pyramid roof statues. He showed the mask to his colleagues. There were two doors leading out of the storeroom, east and west, but the PCs decided not to try them. The group re-convened in the upstairs room.

They decided to wedge the cylinder doors closed, post watches near the open trapdoor, and camp out in and recuperate in the upstairs cylinder room. Thorgald called upon the benevolence of his deity, Ragnar, to heal Korvash, and then the group rested.

That night, an old-man-masked individual showed up in the eastern entrance to the storeroom, distractedly tossed some offal or food remains from a slop bucket into the chamber, then turned and left by the eastern door as swiftly as he had come.

The party decided the next morning to lay in wait for the masked man's return; they assumed he would be back. So they hunkered down in the downstairs chamber, leaving Yohan above. Nothing happened that night, but the party decided to wait it out one more day, and on the next night, their third inside the pyramid, the elf and the thief heard the approach of footfalls beyond the eastern door. They guessed there might be four individuals approaching. They remained hidden.

The eastern door opened, and in came the masked slop-bucket guy, and the party could see three other golden-old-man-masked guys framed in the open doorway, waiting behind in the hallway.

Evelyn cast sleep and all four masked people slumped to the floor.

Moments later, the whole party convened downstairs in the storeroom and awakened the slop-bucket maskie. After a bit of persuasive talk from Thorgald the Priest -- "Hail the Strombringer and the Balancer!" -- the maskie, a Follower of Gorm named Horak, was convinced that the party meant his group no harm. During a moving explanation of their current woes, Thorgald likened his own deity, Ragnar, with the warrior-god Gorm, and this impressed Horak so much that he offered to take the PCs to his leader, who was nearby. They went.

Here's where the PCs went to meet the Brothers of Gorm.

After walking south down a long hallway and turning right into a barracks room with multiple Gorm-mask-wearers, the party met Kanadius, Leader of the Brotherhood of Gorm. After explaining their (pitiful) situation, the PCs were able to convince Kanadius that they could be of service to him as spies or mercenaries in exchange for food and water. Kanadius agreed, offering them food, water, and safe haven here in the area of the pyramid occupied by the Brotherhood, in exchange for the completion of a task: the party must descend one level further into the pyramid and find out if the "Warrior Maidens," who occupy almost half that level, are forming a coalition with the evil "Agents of Zargon."

The party agreed to this, and that is where we will pick up next session.

O Freunde, nicht diese Töne!

2012-01-09T21:11:00.000-05:00

Also Sprach Schpawn:
Well actually, TODAY of all days I REALLY don't give a shit about what kind of sounds everyone wants to make, so go ahead. On most days the fact that the NewYork Times features an article about a mutated humanoid potato and his mom trying to launch a new RPG in their garage so they could earn enough money to buy proper folding chairs would hold little interest for me.

(I assume that's what this is about anyway. I didn't read the article closely. It seems to suggest that Tavis Smiley has his own RPG now as well. I should check it out.)

But TODAY I learned that I could even more NOT give a shit about this AND a vast plenitude of other facts about the world.

BECAUSE I SUBMITTED MY DOCTORAL DISSERTATION TO MY COMMITTEE TODAY AFTER MONTHS AND MONTHS OF SUFFERING AND I AM FLIPPING THE BIRD AT FOOLIOS LARGE AND SMALL LIKE IT WAS GOING OUT OF STYLE.

And now my beloved readers, as our old friends Beethoven and Schiller would put it:

I'm gonna get all feuertrunken! If yer Tochter ain't the aus Elysium kind, send 'er back cuz I don't wann'er! Alle Guten, Alle Bösen, whatever, I don't give a shit!

Call of Cthulhu RPG Edition Question

2012-01-06T15:14:00.001-05:00

I was back on the West Coast for the holidays, visiting family and mainly staying at my parents' home in Washington State. While there, my brother and I did a massive cleaning and reorganization of the old family game closet, and among the treasures unearthed was a semi-complete set of Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu RPG. It was actually purchased by my brother, but I am not sure if he ever played the game or not. I am sorry to report that I never have.

My brother generously urged me to take the CoC RPG stuff back home with me, assuring me he has no interest in it at present. I owe him thanks; what a score!

Some RPG'ing treasure recovered from my parents' place. Originally my brother's, he gifted this stuff to me.

What I have all seems to be CoC Third Edition stuff, including:

- the "What's in this Box" booklet

- Investigator's Book

- Keeper's Book

- world map

- Keeper's screen

Looking at the description of the Third Edition boxed set here, I see that all I am missing is the box itself and the Sourcebook For The 1920s (which sounds awesome).

So my question for all you wise blogospherians is, is CoC Third Edition any good? Does Edition even matter much when it comes to CoC? Any edition-related comments and/or links to resources about CoC RPG you can give me will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

[UPDATE: Or does this preemptively answer my question?]

More to Come

2012-01-04T10:10:00.000-05:00

I've been out of town for a couple weeks, and despite my best intentions, I just never got time to sit down and post about:

- the first two sessions worth of adventures enacted by my local Brockport Campaign as the group begins to explore The Lost City

- the latest play report for my Arandish Campaign (here's Session 47 but Session 48 was played over two weeks ago, before the winter break started)

- reviews of Oubliette #7 and Christian Walker's ongoing 'zine Loviatar

and

- progress reports on the Lands of Ara Compendium 2011, forthcoming (as free pdf) within the month!

All this and more is soon to come.

The Assassination Decree

2011-12-16T10:30:00.000-05:00

I have discussed this subject before, but wanted to formalize this policy for my Arandish Campaign:

Assassination (see Advanced Edition Companion p. 10) only works in the context of a planned, premeditated assassination attempt, NOT in the middle of standard melee combat -- unless that melee combat is being staged for the purpose of committing the assassination. In other words, "Assassination" does NOT equal "backstab followed by chance of instant death" unless it is as part of a premeditated Assassination attempt. This houseruling may limit how this ability works vis-a-vis the wording in the AEC, but that's how things are in Ara.

"File yer complains with me, filthy human scum!"

It's Vornheim, Charlie Brown!

2011-12-12T12:00:00.001-05:00

Says Spawn:

Click to embiggen, naturally.

I took Saturday off from dissertation writing and in addition to starting a batch of sauerruben (fermented turnips) and listening to Wagner and Beethoven, I managed to throw the above image together. It had been percolating in my brain since being reminded of the Vornheim font by this post and learning it can be downloaded here. As was mentioned in the comments, it's so evocative of a specific work that it's not a super-useful font, but it can come in handy for, e.g., Vornheim greeting cards, or similar nonsense like the above.

Had I thought of this a few months ago, this would have been "It's the Great Peryton, Charlie Brown!" I'm sure you can use your imagination for that.

The image comprises elements of original works by Zak S., James E. Raggi IV, Charles M. Schulz, and Andreas Johansson (the electronic font), none of whose claims to copyright or whatever I challenge.

Session 47: Vivuli Makes a Deal

2011-12-10T23:38:00.000-05:00

This session occurred on Thursday 11/17/11 and involved PCs Innominus (Clr-6), Dak (Dwf-6), Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard-5), and Vivuli (Assassin-5 / MU-4). NPC Gorgo (Dwf-4, Innominus' follower) was also onboard this time.

Many of our group members were in slightly different real-world locales for this session: Carl was out of town for work-related training, so he Skyped in from San Francisco, CA; Uncle Junkal's and Viv's players met at the former's on-campus office in Eugene, OR (instead of Carl's house as usual); and Spawn and I broadcast from our homes in PA and NY.

That's Uncle Junkal and Viv in the upper left, Spawn in the top center, and Carl next to him. I'm on the bottom with the camera in front of my face.

The PCs started right where they left off last session, near the center of a vast rectangular chamber with a 600' diameter demonic circle inscribed into the floor. Uncle Junkal and Vivuli pooled their efforts in order to transcribe the symbols from the demonic circle onto parchments, while Dak and Innominus mapped the perimeter of the vast room, both tasks taking over two hours.

Next, in a kind of bizarre "science" experiment, Viv chucked one of his many rats into the demonic circle. There was a flash of bright orange light and the rat vanished, seeming to fall right through the floor into nowhere. Still curious, the rat-master* tied a 15' string to a second rat, and hucked it after its fellow into the circle. Another flash of orange light and this rat too vanished, the twine spooling out through an invisible portal in the floor. The twine spooled out to its full length; Vivuli reeled it back in to find no rat, only a charred end of twine.

Dak, requiring a bowel movement anyway, took a dump and threw the result into the demonic portal after the rats.

Magmatron? they wondered among themselves.

They also wondered if there might not be more as-yet-undiscovered elevator floors, either above or below those already visited.** So they embarked the elevator once again and started mucking about with the levers, attempting to go up to higher levels (if they existed). The elevator rumbled as usual, then a hideous metal-grinding sound went on for awhile, then all went quiet; the elevator hadn't moved. Viv tried another similar lever combination, again the usual rumble followed by bad-sounding grinding noises but no movement from the elevator

LANDS OF ARA FUN QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"This elevator is a piece of shit!"

-- Innominus of Endra

Frustrated with the fricking elevator, the party decided to go back upstairs into the country manor to rest overnight. Before retiring, they learned that Prince Arkus was planning to leave with warriors and clerics for the plague-ridden city of Farn Junction early the next day. Grand Vizier Krock would be staying behind at the country manor outside Fortinbras with a minimal house and administrative staff.

Also, before retiring, Vivuli turned himself, Dak, and Gorgo invisible.

The morning of Day 166 of the party's Arandish adventures, Prince Arkus of Minoch left for Farn Junction, while the party returned to the dungeon levels far beneath the manor, selecting the weird metal triangular chamber as their next port of call.

1 square = 20'

Dak approached the wooden door to the strange chamber and opened it; as his hand turned the doorknob he heard a voice inside his mind hiss at him:

"Stay away, puny filth!"

Despite the mental voice's warning, they all went in anyway and, ignoring the disturbing statue of the tentacled thing with no eyes, headed straight for the northern metal door. Innominus cast detect magic upon it; it glowed extremely brightly. The cleric cast dispel magic upon it; sparks flew all over, arcing off the whole surface of the shiny metal door, and then, subtly, the door began to seem less shiny. The door-metal literally became duller-looking before the party's very eyes.

In this moment Vivuli thought to use his x-ray ring to look through the door; no dice.

Dak being Dak, the dwarf swung his New Steel axe fully at the door -- and rolled a natural "20"! His mighty blow left only a minor scratch on the surface of the metal door, and the dwarf could tell that whatever strange metal this was, it was far stronger than anything yet known on Ara.

So Innominus cast dispel magic upon it again, and it dimmed further, and Dak knocked upon it and yelled "open up!" -- to no avail. Innominus threw Holy Water at the door, chanting prayers -- to no avail.

Then Viv walked away from the door and over to the statue of the tentacled thing, placed his hand upon its slimy surface, and asked it to open the door for them.

Projecting thoughts into Vivuli's mind, the statue responded that it would open the door if he (Viv) would agree to grant it one favor.

Distrusting the look of the statue and noticing that Viv was in some kind of fugue state, Innominus threw Holy Water at the statue. The Water instantly boiled off the statue's surface, seemingly ineffectual.

Meanwhile, inside Vivuli's mind, the Chaotic Assassin decided to accept the statue-entity's terms, agreeing to grant it one favor in the future in exchange for its opening the metal door now. Viv removed his hand from the statue and asked his fellow party members to tie him up, in order to prevent his being forced by the statue to attack them or the like.

Then the metal door slid upward into the wall, and a horrific rotten smell bellowed out into the triangular chamber. It smelled like dead things.

The area beyond that metal door looked like this:

Opened metal door at bottom right of map; 1 square = 10'

Pausing briefly to spike the metal door open, Innominus and Dak advanced into the 40' x 30' room, as Uncle Junkal covered them with his crossbow. The ceiling was arched and all the walls, floor and ceiling were metal. A weird fleshy goop covered most of the floor, and out around the perimeter some small mounds of rotten-smelling fleshy substance grew out of the general pond of goop. Suspecting something green-slime-like, Innominus and Dak prepared oil flasks.

To the east, another shiny metal door in the center of the 30' wall; to the west, an open passageway, also centered in the metal wall. The group decided to advance westward down the passage, and saw ahead of them a much larger chamber filled with wrecked machinery. Scraps of metal and various other materials were piled everywhere, and much of this wreckage was also coated with the ubiquitous stinking, fleshy slime.

50' back, the party spotted something moving in the dark depths of the wreckage chamber. All they could see was an indistinct fleshy mound, but it was definitely advancing toward them.

The party slung oil flasks and shot projectiles, and Innominus cast Prayer. The blob-thing shot electricity bolts at the PCs in retaliation, but after a short yet intense battle, the PCs managed to neutralize the flesh-blob. It disintegrated back into the primordial muck of the flesh-slime.

And that is more or less where the session ended.
--
* Devotees will recall that in Session 44, Vivuli used Conjure Vermin to summon a horde of rats; this session he further announced that he keeps said rats in pockets all throughout his robe -- a "rat-robe."
** So far the PCs have visited four levels via the elevator: (1) the Thoopshib Temple level, from whence they originally came; below that, (2) The Briny level, where they butchered a couple of Ponaturi; below that, (3) the Underwater level with the weird Egg Temple they ransacked; and, atop all the others, (4) the Huge Sulfurous Chamber level, where they began this session.

Lands of Ara Enterprises and the OGL

2011-12-09T16:44:00.000-05:00

As 2011 draws creepingly to a close, I find myself gearing up for some new Lands of Ara-related endeavors, most notably the compilation and self-publication of the Lands of Ara Compendium 2011. This project, which I announced here, offered an artwork preview of here, and posted a tentative Table of Contents for here, is going to be the first official publication of Lands of Ara Enterprises, the publishing entity I have formed with my collaborator Spawn of Endra. My hope is that LAE will function as an "umbrella" or brand identity for future Lands of Ara Compendiums, various adventure modules I plan to release including The Tower of Death, and, in the fulness of time, a Lands of Ara Gazetteer.

Obviously, generating content for these projects is not a problem for me: I really enjoy writing gameable stuff, especially adventure modules. I am also extremely fortunate to have Spawn of Endra as my collaborator / editor-in-chief, for he has a keen eye for (and many technical skills relating to) layout and graphic design. (See, for example, his enlightening queries about Font Use in D&D Products.)

However, where I am still a bit naive and ignorant is in the exact functioning of the OGL and the various legalities behind what I can and can't use from other sources. Sure, I have picked up on some of the general parameters by reading other people's stuff and consulting posts about various "cautionary tales" -- and the most valuable of these to me is a post by David Macauley wherein he outlines two such tales and follows it up with links to crucial resources for using the OGL properly. For my own convenience, and to possibly benefit my readers, I will now re-post those important OGL-related links. I also highly recommend that you check out his original post, esp. the second half. There is also a nice comment by Melan, and some further advice from Matt Finch, which I will excerpt here:

"the OGL can be intimidating if you start by reading the definitions section. In a legal document, capitalized terms are like defined variables. The heavy duty legal language is in the definition of those terms. It is easiest to get familiar with the OGL by skipping the definitions for your first read-through, then reading the definitions to get a better sense of how it works with the details, and then (because you will still be somewhat confused) start going to reputable sources to walk you through it a bit more clearly. Don't rely on those, though; once you have their advice, you should still go back to the OGL for a third reading now that you think you understand how it works."

Now those links:

OGL and OGL FAQ

SRD and SRD FAQ

Thanks, David!

See also Paul Gorman's helpful advice about font use in pdfs.

First Local LL Game -- Initial Report

2011-12-06T08:47:00.004-05:00

Here are a few preliminary details about how this Sunday's local Labyrinth Lord game went. All in all, it was a triumph.

It looks like I will have about five regular players, with one or two others who may drop in and out from time to time. Most of these regulars are veterans of 3.5 and D&D IV play; I have only one truly experienced old-schooler. (More on him in a moment.)

As I said before, I was really hoping to stick to Race-As-Class and other Labyrinth Lord Core Rules conventions, for part of my mission here is to introduce these folks to the mechanics and feel of old-school play, to keep the game as "Moldvay-ish" as possible. In this I was successful: the group conceded to playing LL as writ. Chargen only took one hour, and that time-frame included a lot of discussion about the setting and some gentle guiding of the new-schoolers through the chargen process. Ultimately I had them roll 4d6 (drop the lowest) in order for attributes, then choose their PC's class. All standard LL core classes were available -- even elves!

The session itself was great fun and The Lost City rules! By the end of the session, the PCs had already met their first faction and started negotiating with them, offering to perform a spy mission against one of the other Cynidicean factions in exchange for food and water. They're off!

Full session report to follow.

Related Note: Another Local Game!
That experienced OSR guy I mentioned -- Cid, who ended up playing the party's cleric, Thorgald Thorgaldson, follower of Ragnar -- is starting his own public game at Boldo's Armory, one of the local Rochester area game shops, this coming Sunday. He is running a custom-hacked d20-Lite type system, and setting the campaign in Jeff Rients' Wessex! (From what he says, he literally contacted JR, asked permission to run a campaign in the setting, and apparently received permission plus some background materials and resources from the man himself.) Here is a link to Cid's Obsidian Portal page for the game:

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/taoks

Cid was such a pleasure to play with that as of now I am planning to sit in on his Boldo's campaign on the opposite Sundays from my own local campaign. Local RPG'ing opportunities abound!

Brockport LL Campaign House Rules

2011-12-04T07:58:00.001-05:00

As I mentioned the other day, I am starting a new local Labyrinth Lord campaign here in my home village of Brockport. I hereby dub this enterprise, to be commenced today (six hours hence), The Brockport Campaign. This campaign's name refers to the physical locale of the game sessions in the "real" world, as well as the in-game port city from which the PCs hail. Those PCs have ventured many months' travel west of the prosperous sea port, to find themselves lost in a vast desert. . . .

One ancillary benefit of naming the new game the Brockport Campaign is that the names of my three active campaigns follow an easy-to-memorize A - B - C pattern:

A = Arandish Campaign (commenced 1/18/2010 in Eugene, OR, now plays over Skype)

B = Brockport Campaign (commences 12/4/2011, plays live in Brockport, NY)

C = ConstantCon, Tales From The Hotel Kaladarian (plays in HELL)

At any rate, here are the House Rules I plan* to use for the Brockport Campaign:

Brockport Labyrinth Lord Campaign House Rules

Our campaign shall obey the Labyrinth Lord Core Rules plus:

Shields Shall Be Splintered!
Shields provide the usual +1 bonus to AC. However, they may also be used to "soak" damage from a single attack, thereby reducing damage to zero. Soaking damage destroys the shield.

Shields may also be used against any attack that allows a save for half damage, such as a fireball or dragon's breath. In that case, the shield is destroyed, as above, and the save is considered automatically successful, thereby guaranteeing half damage.

For magical shields, each +1 enchantment bonus gives a 10% chance of surviving a damage soak.

Multiple-Turn Searching for Secret Doors Allowed
This deviates from the "one try only" rule as printed in LL p. 45.

Critical Hits and Fumbles
Any time a player rolls a natural ‘20’ on a to hit roll, it is a critical hit. Damage is doubled.

Likewise, if a player rolls a natural ‘1’ on a to hit roll, it is considered a critical failure or fumble. Typically, this means the combatant hurts himself, drops his weapon, breaks his weapon, or just plain falls down – Labyrinth Lord's discretion.

[EDIT: I removed "The D30 Rule."]

--
* Note: I anticipate having some veteran players onboard -- I know at least two of my probable attendees have played D&D 3.5 and/or D&D IV at any rate -- so plan to spend a wee bit of time at the top of the first session discussing these house rules and making sure nobody has any strong objections or intriguing suggestions. For myself, I am really hoping to stick to Race-As-Class and 3d6 in order, for part of my mission here is to introduce these folks to the mechanics and feel of old-school play. I want the whole thing to be as Moldvay-ish as possible. So I will resist adding AEC classes as best I can; but I do not want to ruin anybody else's good time either, so we'll see what happens. I am easily negotiated with.

Las Hurdes: Surrealist Documentary of a D&D Town?

2011-12-02T11:00:00.003-05:00

From the world of dissertation madness writes Spawn:

Yesterday I was trying to find a reference to something I had written in a journal of mine from 1994 about labyrinths and illusory walls apropos of a conversation with Carter the other day. Then I got sucked into the journal, this was from a fairly rough period in my life during college. (Note to dissertation writers: Don't move across the country in the middle of writing a diss, and never pull out a journal from 17 years ago. Probably you shouldn't be contributing to a blog either.) And I came across this passage from Nov. 23, 1994, the day before Thanksgiving that year:

Today watched this terrible documentary (Los Hurdas) [sic] about goiter victims and dirt-eating cretins and idiots in Spain. Firecracker murder of mountain goats.

This was in an anthro class, Human Adaptability and Variation, which I absolutely loved, and I presume it was a day-before-Thanksgiving filler. Yesterday I looked this up and found out it was actually called "Las Hurdes: Tierra Sin Pan", (Land without Bread), and depicts the incredibly hard life in the Las Hurdes region in the 1930s, a perennially neglected and shunned area of northern Spain, practically medieval even then. The instructor was making a point about the social abuses of physical anthropology in the early 20th century (e.g., cretinism was a diagnosable condition, not just a snobby insult), and how the doco was so staged and artificial. Hence the "firecracker murder of mountain goats": there's a scene where the dispassionate narrator is talking about how the people only rarely eat meat, such as when a mountain goat falls to it's death. The instructor said they set off firecrackers to make the goat fall for the film (you can see a puff of smoke, frame-right). It's only 30 minutes, you should watch it. This is the "Unpromised Land" version, which differs subtly from the original narration*, but is a better film transfer:

What I didn't know was that the film was made by Luis Bunuel, everyone's favorite early surrealist film-maker. And they shot the goat, it wasn't firecrackers. Even if you've never seen his earlier film "Un Chien Andalu", you know Dali was involved, there's ants crawling out of hands, and as the Pixies remind us "Got me a movie! Ooh-ho-ho-ho! Slicin' up eyeballs! Ooh-ho-ho-ho!". Well, in fact, there's an argument (thanks Wikipedia) to be made that the whole thing is in fact more of a parody of documentary films than a mean-spirited effort to portray these people as degenerate sub-humans. Mr. Ruoff's article presents a really interesting analysis. It seems that no one got the joke at the time, or even into the 1990s.

But now that you are properly repositioned as a voyeur of this film, and let's say you watch it three more times and work through your moral outrage at yourself or film or anthropology or surrealism or Franco, this would be a creepy place to go into if the absurdities the doco lays on to reality were accepted as true. By all accounts life was extraordinarily difficult in the region, but in a D&D setting, you enter a town and the festival involves 6 guys pulling the heads off of upside down roosters ... I think Raggi has a module like this. Why do they do all this crazy stuff? Why do they not know what bread is, when they were given bread by the 6 heroes? What's wrong with their water, outside of pigs? Or do the pigs have anything to do with the water? What's the deal with the 18 ruined hermitages within the monastery walls? You get a sense of a fundamentally corrupted, poisoned, cursed land. Maybe the PCs need to figure out what is doing this to the folk and remedy the situation?

Of course the fact that no rooster heads or attempts at ripping them off are shown in the film seems to suggest that this isn't actually what went on in Alberca. Our belief is suspended by the narrator's tone and the ethnographic feel of the film. But, even with the surrealism and sarcasm, the average viewer can probably gain a historical sense that the people suffered because of failures of social governance rather than an evil demon living in a cave who makes even their honey bitter. But it's that sort of metaphorical, mythical imagery -- their honey is bitter! Maybe that's not "weird" but it's wrong -- that makes it interesting for thinking about a Village of Hommlet, or a much warmer, drier version of Vornheim, or Children of the Corn, or Parlier, or wherever else.

And you can impress your friends with references to surrealist film and critiques of ethnography. Win-win!

_________________
* What I think is closer to the first English-language narration is in 3 parts: here, here and here.

ConstantCon Mini-Update and New Local LL Game

2011-11-30T08:13:00.002-05:00

I ran my first ConstantCon game -- Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian Episode 1, "Bat Urine Cleansing Agent" -- about a month ago, but still haven't written up the session report. Shame on me! I will get it composed by the coming weekend if I can.

I launched that ConstantCon campaign in the wake of my aborted public Labyrinth Lord game at Lift Bridge Books. That public game remains aborted for now; nevertheless, since the day of its tanking, I have been approached by many folks asking about whether or not that game was up and running. Students and casual contacts from my College have asked about it, as have the management at the bookstore. Further, those wonderful bookstore staffers (THANKS Joe and Cody!) have collected some referrals from people who have come into the store asking about and/or expressing interest in the old-school D&D game. So between my campus contacts and the three or four phone numbers the bookshop sent me, I regained hope in my ability to establish a local Labyrinth Lord game -- this time in my own home.

You see, when my first attempt at a public game failed, I deduced that either

(1) Sunday afternoons are no good for people schedule-wise,

and/or

(2) would-be participants are not thrilled to play D&D in a public venue.

Turns out it was the latter only. So in recent weeks, I have rustled up a group of about five or six players who are willing to play Labyrinth Lord on Sunday afternoons at my place!

This group meets for the first time this coming Sunday to roll characters and start adventuring!!

In time, if this group jells and feels confident to do so, maybe we will take our game back to the bookstore and play in public. But it seems like it has been easier to convince people to play, and may be easier to get them comfortable with each other and me, in a private venue for the time being.

In any case, now I will have two regular groups running simultaneously, plus occasional Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian. A fruitful and exciting RPG'ing schedule, not to mention more fodder for the blog.

Take THAT, you fiend!

Compendium's Tentative TOC

2011-11-28T08:44:00.002-05:00

In the comments to my recent post on the artwork of the Lands of Ara Compendium 2011, Peter Regan (of Oubliette fame) asked:

"Can you give us an idea of the page count and a table of contents at this stage?"

To which I replied that "so far it's a loose list that my Editor-in-Chief (Spawn of Endra) hasn't yet vetted. But I will post a list of the likely Compendium contents as soon as I can."

And now I honor that promise! Note that what follows is neither a comprehensive list -- more stuff may be added -- nor (on the other hand) an accurate representation of how much total stuff will make it in -- I suspect that the final Compendium will have a shorter TOC than this one. But this will give you an idea of what I've been thinking about in a general way . . . .

LANDS OF ARA COMPENDIUM 2011

Sample Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION by Spawn of Endra and Carter Soles

RULES MODIFICATIONS
Arandish Horse Movement Rates

MONSTERS
Trolls of Ara
Demons of Ara
Dragons of Ara
Horned Cyclops
Sleestak
Dimetrodon, Fire-Breathing
Dimetrodon, Aquatic
Dimetrodon, Flying
Blaag
Swamp Tiger
Mind Flayer for LL (ROCC psionics)
Undead Yeti
Undead Stirge

TRAPS and ITEMS
Ogre Acid Pool
Triple Fire Trap Room
Holy Water Bolas
Gunger Beykr's Chime of Infallible Wayfaring
Alaxxx's Penny of Retrieval

NPCS
Rogath the Swamp-Ranger
Dalgoop of Minoch
Toran (N. Achelonian ogre fighter)
Rabbit-Head
Elzar the Horrid
Hokka and His Crew
Grel Kalorian, elf mage
Gorgo of Gannar
Beastarr the Bobcat
Hobart the Ambiguous

UPDATE:
ERSTWHILE PETTY GODS
St. Ainless of Inocks, Patron Saint of Metal Accoutrments
Dozentit, Goddess of Perfunctory Inquiry

ALTERNATE PC RACES AND CLASSES
Rodians (race as class and advanced versions)
Ogres as PCs
2d6 Bardery / Basic Arandish Bard
Bard Variant: The Jongleur
2d6 Rangery

SPELLS
Scumbrella
Stickyfoot
Troglodyte Stench Burst
Cannibal Curse
Vomitus Deluge
Alaxx's Zib Flobble
Alaxx's Zib Floogle
Dunce-Face
Symbol of Porn

ADVENTURES
One-Hour Dungeon Map
Sark's Cave, an Expansion for Wraithstone Isle

IDEAS AND INSPIRATIONS
2D Barcode Maps
Aleister Crowley, Master of the Random Table
random d30 table(s)
d30 rule retrospective

That's all I've got on the list so far, plus numerous illustrations by Kelvin Green. As I say, I suspect we may need to trim this down a bit before it goes to press, or it will be too big to be easily usable.

What Character Am I?

2011-11-27T10:27:00.000-05:00

Always a sucker for whatever bandwagon is passing through the blogosphere, I have joined Peter and David in taking the What Kind of D&D Character Would You Be? test. Here are the results, which reveal me as the conformist I truly am:

I Am A: Lawful Good Human Fighter/Wizard (3rd/3rd Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-13
Dexterity-12
Constitution-11
Intelligence-13
Wisdom-12
Charisma-16

Alignment:
Lawful Good A lawful good character acts as a good person is expected or required to act. He combines a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly. He tells the truth, keeps his word, helps those in need, and speaks out against injustice. A lawful good character hates to see the guilty go unpunished. Lawful good is the best alignment you can be because it combines honor and compassion. However, lawful good can be a dangerous alignment when it restricts freedom and criminalizes self-interest.

Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.

Primary Class:
Fighters can be many things, from soldiers to criminal enforcers. Some see adventure as a way to get rich, while others use their skills to protect the innocent. Fighters have the best all-around fighting capabilities of the PC classes, and they are trained to use all standard weapons and armor. A fighter's rigorous martial training grants him many bonus feats as he progresses, and high-level fighters have access to special melee maneuvers and exotic weapons not available to any other character.

Secondary Class:
Wizards are arcane spellcasters who depend on intensive study to create their magic. To wizards, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art. When they are prepared for battle, wizards can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. The wizard's strength is her spells, everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. A wizard can call a familiar- a small, magical, animal companion that serves her. With a high Intelligence, wizards are capable of casting very high levels of spells.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)

A Two-Part Revelation About Bards

2011-11-25T12:40:00.002-05:00

1. Zak's initial breakdown.

2. Zak's additional clarification, also reprinted below:

(Note especially the comment in the far bottom left:

"people obsessing over their mechanics as if that mattered")

With all due respect to Uncle Junkal, who I very much enjoy having in my campaign, I admit to feeling this way myself sometimes. My annoyance has less to do with objection to the Bard character type as such, but to the immense difficulties inherent in making the Bard class work within the rules without feeling patently stupid or wonky at times.

Should Bardery simply be role-played?

Session 46: Raiders of the Underwater Temple

2011-11-20T11:27:00.003-05:00

This session, played 11/3/11, included PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Hazel (Ftr 4 / MU 4), Yor (Dwf 6), Dak (Dwf 6), Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 4), and Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard 4), plus NPCs Gorgo (Dwarf-4) and Fuzz (Ftr-2).

The party was still monkeying around with the same elevator they discovered last session. Having just killed two big Ponaturi in a tunnel on what I'll call the "Briny Level," the group decided to attempt to ride the elevator even further down into the bowels of the earth. An appropriate place for scum of their sort, in my view.

At any rate, leaving Hazel's follower Fuzz up on the Thoopshib Temple level to work the levers, Vivuli issued him instructions via his monkey familiar, also left upstairs. One lever pull later, the elevator rumbled, and down they went, 800' feet farther below the Briny Level, to a place where they beheld a strange sight indeed.

The elevator exit opened west onto what appeared to be an underwater scene. The ever-bold Dak stuck his arm through the exit-way, feeling a slight tingle as his hand passed through a transparent force-field into rather cold (salt) water. Though it was very dark, the PCs determined that they were looking out at a sea floor about 50' below the level of the elevator floor. The eerie underwater scene was dimly illuminated by some distant light source to the west.

All the party members quaffed water breathing potions. Dak drove a spike into the elevator room floor, tied a rope to it, and the party tethered themselves to this rope in the following marching order: Dak - Yor - Hazel - Innominus - Uncle Junkal. All these (plus Vivuli) set off through the portal, marching along the sea floor toward the light source; Vivuli, untethered, swam a few feet above the column of his comrades as they made their way westward.

The party had a total of 550' of rope, which got them to within about 150' of the light source when they ran out of tether. The pale green light emanated from a huge, glowing, egg-shaped object sticking up out of the sea floor ahead. Vivuli swam ahead alone to scope out the structure more closely, and was able to see that, in the east face of the natural-seeming stone "pedestal" (really an outcropping of the sea floor itself) that cradled the glowing "Egg," there was inset an arched entranceway, 20' across and 30' high. Pitch darkness lurked within the archway; that darkness had a sickly green tint to it.

Vivuli swam back to his rope-bound comrades and, on the basis of his reportage, the group decided to go back upstairs to the Prince's Manor (to rest, recuperate magical abilities, etc.) before returning the next day to explore this weird underwater structure. In particular, Innominus wanted to regain his Locate Object spell, so as to track the location of the coin he placed in the Thoopshib Temple slot a few sessions ago.

Back upstairs in the Manor house, the party learned that the recently recovered Prince Arkus planned to hasten to Farn Junction with cadre of priests in order to save as many citizens of the plague-ridden town as possible. He was taking a regiment of his soldiers north within the next day or so, and was having Grand Vizier Krock and Father Azamondius write letters to numerous Minochian and Kaladarian Holy Orders calling for priests capable of curing disease to meet them just outside Farn Junction. Innominus offered some advice to the Prince on how to proceed with Operation Rescue Farn Junction, but the party felt that their own work was here at the Country Manor, routing out the demonic threat that still dwelt somewhere in its bowels.

Vivuli cast invisibility on the two dwarves that night, and all rested.

On the morning of Day 165 of the party's Arandish adventures, as Prince Arkus readied his men for the rescue operation to the north, the party rode the underground elevator back to the underwater level, quaffed more water breathing potions, and headed back across the sea floor toward the eerie Egg. Innominus cast Locate Object, and indeed that coin of his seemed to be located somewhere within the glowing, Egg-like structure.

They went through the archway and inside, finding themselves in a large (40' x 160' with 30' ceilings), dark, pillared chamber (see map above). They moved slowly into the place (dashed arrow) in their previously established marching order, only with Vivuli in front this time.

Innominus detected for magic and evil, finding that the twelve pillars in the place radiated literally the strongest magic he'd ever seen, and that the entire place radiated very strong evil. He also cast detect traps, which didn't reveal much.

As they walked westward, the group noticed two other sinister features of the area:

- the spaces between the two columns of pillars to their right and left were TOTALLY black, as if some kind of Void occupied that space (see shaded regions on map), and

- there were two 18' tall statues in the place, one at the extreme north end of the room, one at the south. The northern statue depicted a huge lobster-like creature, with LOTS of eyes on numerous eyestalks, plus two great eyeballs clasped, one each, in its pair of huge pincers. The southern statue looked like this:

Reaching the west side of the rectangular room, the group found Innominus' coin: it rested inside a basin set into the west wall of the south section of the chamber. This basin, seemingly made of platinum, was an offerings plate of some kind, with 385gp in it, along with seven huge (10" diameter) pearls.

The party immediately discussed how they might successfully loot the pearls, and Hazel suggested using the old bait-and-switch move like Indiana Jones did in the opening sequence of Raiders of the Lost Ark: find some valueless object of roughly equal weight and swap it out (quickly!) for the pearls in the basin.

Dak went outside to the sea floor and located a suitably sized boulder while Innominus and Hazel readied defensive spells. The dwarf brought the boulder in, and in a carefully timed effort, he rolled it onto the offerings pedestal as Vivuli pilfered the pearls, the gold coins, and the platinum tray itself! The two thieves were tethered to a rope, which their comrades Uncle Junkal, Fuzz, and Gorgo immediately hauled upon, bringing the looters and their loot back outside the glowing Egg structure.

Innominus then prudently cast Wall of Law inside the chamber, surrounding the central 20' walkway (see line on map) and utterly covering their retreat. That spell:

"Shines as a bright light that will hold all intelligent undead at bay. In addition to taking 1d8 points of damage, any Neutral or Chaotic creatures passing through this barrier must make a save versus Spells and Spell-like Devices at -1 or be calmed for one hour afterwards. Calmed creatures are -2 on all combat rolls during this hour."

Nothing came out of the Egg after them, though Innominus sensed Evil Undead spirits within, unable to pass the Wall of Law he had created.

The group then hastened back to the elevator and rode it to the highest level they knew of: the huge, sulfurous-smelling chamber located 200' above the Thoopshib Temple level they originally came from.

The PCs cursorily poked around in that vast chamber. Yor and Dak walked its perimeter, learning that its dimensions were 1000' (north to south) by 1400' (east to west), with 40' ceilings. Next the whole party* walked out 400' eastward toward the center of the room, and found some demonic etchings in the floor, inscribing a vast, 600' diameter circle. Uncle Junkal and Viv both instantly recognized this as some kind of demonic summoning circle.

And this is where the session ended.

DM's Notes
Uncle Junkal leveled up to Rodian Bard-5.

--
*Technically minus Hazel, whose player had had to retire by this point in the evening.

Compendium Artwork Update

2011-11-18T16:01:00.003-05:00

The Lands of Ara Compendium 2011, described here as "collected highlights of the gaming content from the Lands of Ara blog from its inception in 2009 until the end of 2011, to be released as a free, downloadable pdf in the first weeks of 2012," is slowly starting to come together.

In that same post I mentioned that killer OSR artist Kelvin Green was working on new illos for the Compendium, and indeed he has recently delivered these! So here is a teaser of what is to come, in the form of Kelvin's awesome depiction of an Undead Yeti:

And speaking of killer OSR artists, we have commissioned the Compendium's front cover illustration from Johnathan Bingham. As Johnathan recently wrote, he is well into the initial sketching phase already, and once he has worked his magic, his wife Daisey will be colorizing the cover image for us! No preview yet, but I can tell you I'm very excited about this piece, as well as a number of other GREAT Kelvin Green pics I am keeping secret until the release of the Compendium.

Pimping an Archaeology Blog

2011-11-15T18:32:00.000-05:00

Ahoy says Spawn:

This is just quick note to pimp a newish blog about archaeology that an old friend of mine is running, called The Subversive Archaeologist. Rob is a Canadian living in California, has a bunch of degrees, and is very opinionated about archaeology. He has plenty of axes to grind, particularly when it comes to claims that Neandertals were cognitively like anatomically modern humans, had religion, had burial practices, language, symbol expression, etc. Bogus, says he. His blog is well written, takes folks to task ... Hmm. Canadian, opinionated, good writer with a slightly high-brow tone, telling everybody they're doing it wrong. It's almost like reading Alexis's blog, except you get the feeling that Rob doesn't think most of his readers are stupid.

Well, that ought to move some traffic over there.

At any rate, if you have any interest in archaeology and critical analysis of the discipline, check it out.

Caldo Ba (Gopher Stew), or Wilderness Foraging LARP

2011-11-13T14:59:00.000-05:00

Propoundeth Ein Spawn:

Coincidental with hunting mechanics overtaking my focus in the last couple of days (please check out Talysman's stuff on hunting, gathering and malnutrition/starvation mechanics ... and encourage him to continue with his Liber Zero and Liber Blanc projects, wherein all of this great stuff may be compiled in two awesome places), I was trying to find some images for my disseration and ran across a sequence of photos of me cooking gopher stew in camp in Belize. Just to show that I'm not against capturing and cooking small game here's a little photo essay. The dish is call caldo ba in Spanish/Mopan Maya. One of the project members was paying folks to bring her ba heads for a study, and I eventually told her we should be getting the whole animal (duh, stupid gringos). So a Maya friend of our set some traps and snagged us Mr. Ba.

Here is his head with hair (part of the study) and the rest of the gutted carcass with the hair singed and scraped off. Fresh ba meat smells a lot like rabbit meat, slightly sweet.

Here's the prep counter/pantry. On the left you see a wa'a leaf with a bunch of fresh culantro that was gathered by another Maya friend. It smells a lot like cilantro (coriander leaf for our UK readers), but is stronger and sharper. Good for caldo! Also the obligatory Belikin stout.

Here I am prepping the ba and vegetables (I imagine this the sort of prep that The Happy Whisk is always talking about). Ba was cut into 6 pieces so everyone could have a taste, and here is sitting in a bunch of garlic, salt and pepper. Also going in: literal Maya onions, bell peppers and tomatoes.

Now for a bit of browning the ba, onions and garlic. In a crappy aluminum pot! Yay! Why did I not change out of my field clothes, you ask? I probably wasn't digging that day, and had a beer shower (whereby drinking a few stouts makes you feel less dirty than you are).

You gotta problem with that?

Now adding the rest of the veggies.

Cooking gopher stew is a lonely business, my friends. That's the dinner table in the background that slopes violent to the right, and has delightfully warped and splinter-causing benches. Obligatory One Barrel Rum calendar in the background.

Here's the finished product with the achiote soup stock and culantro added.

And a portion of caldo ba along with the usual dinner items: rice and salsa, corn tortillas and unidentified breaded object, perhaps a piece of chicken. Overall, quite tasty. There's not a hell of a lot of meat on a gopher, but since these ones eat a lot of fresh corn and so forth, they have a not-so-gamey flavor. I recommend giving it a shot. Bon appetit!

Optimal Foraging Theory and D&D Wilderness Mechanics: A Half-Assed Treatment

2011-11-12T10:00:00.001-05:00

Said Spawn of Endra:

Hunting seems to be a hot topic in the last day or so, between this spell of Mr. Bat's that causes people to hunt (a great spell to clear a bunch of people out of a village so you could steal their stuff, if you ask me), and this Simple Hunting mechanic laid down by Mr. Talysman. I always dig what Talysman puts forth. His posts are often what I wish I could come up with instead of my own posts that are 80% material that only I find amusing, and maybe have 20% of something useful for anybody else. As I commented on his post, I think he's got a simple mechanic that is also nicely granular. But wilderness foraging rules still just stick in my craw, and I've touched on that once before when looking at the Joy of Cooking Grindhouse Edition.

In the comments to Tal's post I bitched about "Why is wilderness food-getting all hunting and no plant gathering?", and I said "Well when I'm in Belize I just go eat bush food and look at me I'm so special." What kind of a twat writes stuff that? But anyway, to me hunting game is just a big risk and big waste of time for the traveler. Here's my take on wilderness adventuring hunting.

First, why are you in the wilderness? You either have a specific goal to get to and you've decided it's quicker to risk going off-road to reach it, or you've got a vague sense that there's something in a general area and you've got to explore the hex until you find it. Or you got teleported there or whatever other deus ex machina scenario. [I have literally never played a hex crawl session, so please jump in and tell my why else you are in the wilderness.]

Second, why are you hunting? You ran out of rations, I guess. Is this bad planning? Lack of player skill? Or did something steal your rations, or they got rained on? Hmm. Well if it's either of the latter cases, the DM cares about not hand-waiving* the particulars of wilderness adventuring. If one has to resort to a hunting mechanic, simple or otherwise, one is probably the DM that wants grit and realism in the hexcrawl (or delights in another tool to throw shit at the PCs perhaps?). As a player, well, I'm going to buy so many iron rations and commission a 500gp sack for them that is both waterproof and has a chainmail outer lining before I play in your game.

The PC is hunting because he/she/it has no food. The player is hunting because the DM is stripping away attribute points like CON or STR (and CHA, obviously -- starving people are just NOT attractive), and probably HP. So I propose this axiom or something:

No hunting mechanic should exist without a preceding starvation mechanic

That's a problem with LabLord, which otherwise has a decent (i.e., plant-gathering option) mechanic: the penalties for starvation are left to the DM. Raggi's Grindhouse Rules (p.36) do give a mechanic, which is a Save vs. Poison each day or lose 1 CON. At the same time, he acknowledges the real problem is dehydration -- Save or CON is at half.

Note that I'm not proposing any mechanics myself. First off I'm too busy, otherwise lazy and stupid to do so. Second, I don't see the realism that it would add as adding fun overall. Any hunting mechanic must exchange PC time for caloric returns. That's at some cost of movement rates through the wilderness. Depending on the starvation mechanic, in most real situations one is better off just moving on toward the goal rather than spending time and energy chasing game they may not catch, i.e, get out of the wilderness. Time spent hunting is also time for Wandering Monsters to appear. They may either kill you or solve your starvation problem by becoming food. At worst, I envision a space where the party has to devote all their time to hunting rather than moving, and so end up in a positive feedback loop that locks them into sitting in place and not adventuring because they need to devote all their time to hunting. Sucks to that ass-mar.

Why hunt when you can gather?
I'm an archaeologist, and I draw on the anthropological traditions of cultural ecology and what is typically called human behavioral ecology in my work, among a billion other things. Before starting this post , I went back to some classics looking for data to show why hunting shouldn't take precedence over plant gathering. And I got confused. Here's a classic on Ache foraging by Hawkes et al. (1982)** that shows that deer and peccary are the highest ranked resources they encounter in Paraguay, and most plants and insects are lower ranked:

The ranking is based on the caloric return per unit of time devoted to search, pursuit, and handling/processing. So big animals are higher ranked, and when encountered they should always be taken as opposed to the palm hearts that present themselves at the same time (which are lower ranked due low calories and processing time). Beyond a point of caloric return per unit of time, some potential food sources should always be excluded from the diet, no matter how abundant or easy to get:

Ei/hi is energy per handling time by resource, and E/t is energy return per time invested in foraging given the breadth of resources in the diet (i.e., the return at rank 4 is for a diet that includes resources ranked 1-4 inclusive). It happens that plants are more abundant, so the encounter rate for these resources is higher than for game, but in this group of foragers a lot of the diet is made up of game (about 75% during the period of this study). But it's important that as the diet breadth increases, (the number of resources acquired from rank 1 to rank 12 increases), the average returns of foraging per hour increase. So all the stuff from rank 7 to 10, including the larvae, birds, palm products, capuchin monkeys, lead to overall higher average returns.

These returns are in kcal/hr, so for a 2000 kcal/day diet, this is going to mean ~2.5 hr foraging/PC/day when plants and all the better stuff is included (~800 kcal/hr return). If you only take big game (the two 1st ranked resources) and ignore other foods, you'll get big caloric returns when you bag them, but the hourly return rate goes down to ~100 kcal/hr, so it's going to take 8 times as long if you're picky. That assumes you're in Paraguay and you're with subsistence foragers, or have a good ranger, etc.

If you added the costs involved in devoting so much time to hunting, like random monsters encounters with no loot reward, some other plot-related time-crunch, then all of these things get shifted around. More time spent foraging = more bad stuff, and therefore PCs are foolish to go for the big kill. They should get on to their goal, and not sink time into hunting big game. But again, the DM and the players need to know the costs of starvation for these types of evaluation and decision-making to have any meaning.

And next time I put my money where my mouth is: The Spawn of Endra cooks gopher soup in Belize.

____________________________________________________________________

*Is it hand-waving or hand-waiving? Discuss on spellingpedantry.com.
** The reference is: Kristen Hawkes, Kim Hill, & James F. O'Connell. (1982).Why Hunters Gather: Optimal Foraging and the Aché of Eastern Paraguay. American Ethnologist, Vol. 9, No. 2, Economic and Ecological Processes in Society and Culture, pp. 379-398.

Pledge Drive for LL Ref's Screen!

2011-11-10T21:49:00.001-05:00

Hey Labyrinth Lord fans! Make sure to check out the Labyrinth Lord Referee Screen "Kickstarter" Pledge Drive -- make your pledge before December 10 to ensure that this awesome product actually goes to print! The three-panel screen will include original art by Steve Zeiser, and signed copies are available as well. Here is the link directly to Kickstarter -- waste no time -- make your pledge TODAY!

Thoughts About Skill Systems

2011-11-05T10:31:00.002-04:00

I was chatting with Spawn of Endra the other day about Bards and multi-classed characters in old-school Labyrinth Lord-type games. As regular readers know, our own gaming group has struggled mightily over the issue of how to integrate a Bard class into our present campaign, and to be blunt, I am STILL not 100% satisfied with what we've come up with, as I recently confessed.

The problem stems from the "skill system" conundrum observed by so many other grognards. And that conundrum originates with the Thief (not the Bard) class, though the problem carries forward into all other "special" classes outside the "core" classes, which I define (at least provisionally) as Fighter, Cleric, and Magic-User, plus the race-as-classes such as Dwarf, Elf, Halfling and (in Ara) Rodian.

That's right, I am officially going on record now as excluding Thieves from the core D&D classes, even though they appear as a "core" class in Labyrinth Lord. To be clear, I do not mind the concept of a thief, i.e., a specialist who develops expertise in certain areas like finding traps and picking pockets. Nor do I mind the general concept of Bards, i.e., experts in folklore and public performance and storytelling and the like. No, I actually really like these "specialist" classes for their core concepts, I just despise what the grafting on of skill systems does to the game, specifically the way in which it can interfere with player ingenuity and role-playing.

Let me give a few examples. The first couple will relate to my experiences DM'ing Uncle Junkal, our party's Rodian Bard, and just let me make clear right out of the gate that I do NOT blame Uncle Junkal or his player for these disappointments of mine. They are ultimately my responsibility for not seeing how the Delving Deeper Bard, as good as it is, participates in the form of "skill resolution" that started with the introduction of the traditional Thief class and ultimately kind of dampens things for me. So this is My fault, which is why I am discussing it now, in an attempt to fix it while still being as fair as possible to my current PCs.

Example #1: Uncle Junkal Charms Grand Vizier Krock. Back in Session 35, our beloved rodian bard used his charm person ability to place himself in the good graces of Prince Arkus' right-hand man. This whole episode was brilliantly role-played by Uncle Junkal's player: he used his juggling and entertaining skills to get near the Vizier, then, after amusing him with some tricks, started asking him innocuous questions about the Prince's visit and the like. He built trust with the charmed Krock, so by the time he started planting ideas about the the local dwarves, it made sense that the Vizeier would listen to him. It was a delight to see this unfold even though it did involve an initial successful 2d6 Charm Person skill check, as we developed for our Arandish Bard Class

A Solution: No skill roll needed? Maybe just role-play it out as we did anyway? What did the skill roll really lose us or gain us? Is it necessary?

Example #2: Uncle Junkal deciphers the significance of Ponaturi Runes. Just this last session or two, the Bard has been using his Legend Lore ability to decipher the meanings of runes inscribed on the pillars and doors around the Temple of Thoopshib. This has been going okay all in all, but I have found the skill roll itself to be intrusive. Being the great player he is, Uncle Junkal's player always explains and justifies how he would know certain things in-character; in this case, he would know seagoing legends about Thoopshib due to his background as a rodian, which is a seafaring culture.

A Solution: The player and I related Uncle Junkal's bardic knowledge to the rodian's background and back story anyway, so again, what function did the roll serve? Did we need it? Or am I just nitpicking?

UPDATE! Since writing the introductory remarks and examples above, I have played one more session with the group and actually have found Uncle Junkal's skill rolling far less obtrusive this time. I did not mind the Legend Lore rolls he made; I just, if you'll pardon the pun, "rolled with it." And it worked out fine. I guess it IS kind of old-school to trust the roll of the dice, and perhaps I should appreciate the random element (and hence excitement) skill rolls introduce into the game. With the roll of the dice, it cuts both ways: I think the Bard actually failed more Legend Lore rolls than he made last session. There were surely a couple timnes when he failed to recognize some potentially important rune. So maybe I am making a bigger deal of this skill system thing than it needs to be. Yet. . .

Example #3: Vivuli "Assassinates" Thoopshib. In Session 44, Vivuli snuck up on the physical manifestation of the demigod Thoopshib and, upon successfully sneak-attacking it, made a roll to assassinate it. Now this makes about as much sense to me in retrospect as Uncle Junkal charming an extremely hostile, human and demi-human-hating rock troll does, but I tend to be indulgent of my players' whims in the heat of the moment, and given that we were in the climactic seconds of a pitched melee battle, I allowed Viv's assassination attempt to occur. Note also that for that attempt Vivuli's player rolled "00" on his d%, which would technically be a critical failure, NOT a critical success! So it was fucked in every possible way. But what I SHOULD have done was to grant Viv his sneak attack bonuses and let him attack the thing normally -- it really WASN'T a proper assassination attempt, which should be pre-planned and done for political reasons or for hire. In other words, in this case I FAILED to push Viv's player to role-play it out or justify it. Perhaps understandable under the circumstances -- I did not see it coming -- but nevertheless a misapplication of the rules (or at least the spirit of the rules) as far as I am concerned. My bad for not catching it sooner.

A Solution: Enforce tighter restrictions on what counts as an "assassination" [any suggestions about this from the blogosphere?] and remember that a sneak attack and an assassination are two different things, even though they may often (in practical play situations) coincide.

Some tentative conclusions (?): In some ways the bane of my existence as a Labyrinth Lord has been my open-door policy toward the content of the Advanced Edition Companion. The spells and monsters therein are easily added to basic Labyrinth Lord without disrupting things at all, but the new "advanced" classes can be troublesome, and the rules for "Multiclassing" open up dangerous doors as well, as Telecanter has discussed here and here. Nothing against Vivuli, who I love, but I see now that I should not have let Assassins (as writ in the AEC) into the game. Hell, I don't even want standard Labyrinth Lord Thieves in my game! If anything, I should treat Assassins and Thieves exactly as I would prefer to treat Bards -- as Specialists, using a "x in 6" skill system, as in LotFP Grindhouse.

Why? Because James Raggi's system accounts for specialized skill use while retaining compatibility with certain "basic skills" that ALL PCs (regardless of class) can perform, like searching for secret doors and hearing noises. Since everybody has a base 1 in 6 chance to do stuff like that anyway, Raggi's Grindhouse Rules maintain, why not simply have "thieves" be people with a slightly increased chance to do the same stuff? As James Maliszewski has written, ALL older edition D&D dungeoneers are assumed to be de facto thieves:

"the Thief is a self-justifying class. Prior to its introduction in Greyhawk, pretty much every "thief ability" was something a character of any class might attempt. Listening at doors? Check. Moving silently? Check. Locating and disarming traps? Check. The list goes on. I've noted before that 'thief' is an occupation that could describe characters of any class."*

According to this line of thinking, it really doesn't make sense to have separate "thieves' skills" in the game at all. No, "thieves" would more properly be adventurers who happen to specialize in those kinds of dungeoneering skills instead of focusing more effort on, say, martial prowess or the arcane arts. So it's better to call them Specialists if you need to differentiate them from the other PC classes, since ALL PC classes are thieves!

--
* Interestingly, in this same post, Maliszewski goes on to defend the existence of the Assassin class. It also worth noting that over time, Mr. M. made peace with the thief class -- see his discussion here and here, and his final result here.

Session 45: Underground Elevator Hijinks

2011-10-30T11:31:00.004-04:00

"I bet you fish-people taste good!"

--Uncle Junkal

This session, played Thursday 10/13/2011, included PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Hazel (Ftr 4 / MU 4), Yor (Dwf 6), Dak (Dwf 6), Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 4), and Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard 4) -- the whole merry gang!

[EDIT: NPCs Gorgo (Dwarf-4) and Fuzz (Ftr-2) were present as well.]

Scale = 20' per square. The "elevator room" is the circular room in the center near the top.

The party started off in the circular "elevator room" in which they concluded last session. However, at Dak's suggestion, they swiftly decided to go back above ground for a day or so in order to heal, rest, and recuperate and to gain back spells and the like. Once upstairs in the Country Manor House now occupied by the recovering Prince Arkus, Dak and Innominus asked Father Azamondius and Grand Vizier Krock whether or not the Brothers of Carcoon would be willing to provide them with some dispel magic scrolls for their return to the depths. Father Azamondius promised to supply them with three such divine scrolls.

The party then headed back into Fortinbras, where they rent a home on the walled town's southwest side. One of their first orders of business was to visit a local alchemist's shop, Crazy Larry's Potion Vendor, and see how many water breathing potions they could get their hands on. Crazy Larry told them he could sell them seven such potions immediately, for 300gp each; if they wanted more, it would take a week for them to arrive over the mountains from Blintsport.

The party ultimately ordered thirty (!) potions of water breathing (five for each PC) from Crazy Larry's Potion Vendor, and waited around in Fortinbras for the week it took them to arrive. Some highlights from that week include:

+ Hazel did her usual of looking around town for unusual arcane items. She asked around for spell scrolls for wall of ice and wall of fire, to little avail. The main Council Spell Library is north in Farn Junction -- a metropolis currently Dark Plague-ridden.

+ Vivuli spent most of his week at the house, tending his snake pits and attempting to harvest venom from some of the asps in his home collection. He was successful, but it is slow going, and he got only one dose of poison for his week's labor.

+ Returning to the caverns far beneath the Country Manor, Dak assisted his dwarven excavation team in building load-bearing supports in the Thoopshib Temple, preparatory to knocking down the partially desecrated Temple's remaining pillars.

+ Innominus also returned underground and spent the week doing some detection work in the circular elevator room. He cast detect magic on all four doors in the chamber, finding that the little Thoosphib runes on the doors did indeed radiate magic. Vivuli assisted the cleric, using his x-ray vision ring to peek at what lay beyond the north and south doors: a storage room at the end of a hallway to the north, and a spiral stars down to the south. He also noticed that the doors were attached to the shaft walls and opened away from the elevator; the circular elevator room had openings at all four cardinal compass points, but no actual doors attached.

+ Meta-game-wise, this is about when Uncle Junkal's player showed up for the session [see DM's Notes]. In-game, Uncle Junkal visited the elevator room with Innominus and Viv and helped identify the fish-head runes on the doors, as well as some markings near the control panel levers, as belonging to the language of the Ponaturi, a dreaded mythical race of sea-dwelling fish-men.

At the end of the week, the party gathered their potions and headed back down to the elevator room. Their attention immediately went to the eastern control room, and, as Dak immortally put it:

"I guess I'm not opposed to messing with the levers."

It was decided that Viv would man the levers, Uncle Junkal would remain with him in the control room, and Innominus, Dak, Yor, and Hazel would ride the elevator.

Viv tried several different combinations, too numerous to document here, of the four levers in their up, down, and middle (neutral) positions. The first result he produced, after a few tries, was to cause a loud rumbling noise, then the whole circular chamber went up. It ascended approximately 200' and stopped. The only entrance out of the elevator on this level was to the east: the elevator opened into a vast, dark chamber, not unlike the one the party visited in Session 42. There wasn't much to see there besides a four-levered control panel just inside the vast chamber, so Viv cranked some more levers and eventually brought the elevator room down. However, at the same time as he struck upon the right lever pull, he saw a potent vision in his mind, of the Fish-Thing Thoopshib hissing in hatred at him. Viv was mind-blasted by the vision, and took physical damage from its "psychic hiss attack." The elevator arrived back on his level.

A few more lever pullings sent the elevator plunging downward, down 600' to a briny-smelling natural tunnel headed north. It was pitch dark. As Vivuli tampered with more lever positions in an attempt to return the party to his level, the PCs on the briny level below faintly heard sounds of movement or activity echoing down the northbound passage toward them.

At Dak's behest, Innominus placed his amulet of continual light into his sling and sent it flying down the large (30' diameter) passage. It flew 80' north and struck a side wall, glancing off to the left (west) at a slight westward bend of the tunnel. Dak and Innominus then headed northward toward the light, weapons brandished . . .

. . . Hazel readied her wand of paralyzation and prepared a spell . . .

. . . . upstairs, Viv tried another combination of levers, and the elevator started rumbling . . .

. . . and Dak and Innominus saw grotesque shadows cast upon the tunnel wall, of huge, 15' tall bipedal fish-creatures, armed with tridents, coming down the passage toward them. Backlit as they were by Innominus' thrown amulet, the two monstrosities' exact facial features were indistinct, but they gurgled and growled menacingly as they advanced, and the party struck immediately.

Dak threw an oil flask at the fish-things, striking one and setting it on fire, while Innominus prayed to Endra and cast Hold Person, which seemed not to affect them.

Fierce battle ensued, coupled with a plan: the melee fighters, along with some phantasmal forces of Hazel's, would slowly lure the fish-creatures down toward the south end of the passage nearest the elevator, where Hazel waited with the paralyzation wand. Then the dwarves and Innominus would leap aside and Hazel would zap the fish-things!

Hazel cast phantasmal force, and had some henchman-looking types march in toward the Ponaturi. The Ponaturi seemed to believe in these phantasms at first, and attacked them with their stupendous tridents, while the PCs, retreating southward down the passage, peppered the fish-things with missile fire. Soon, however, the Ponaturi lost interest in their ghostly attackers, and advanced on the flesh-and-blood PCs. Vicious melee ensued, and eventually one fish-man was cut down to chum, and the other one was successfully paralyzed by Hazel's wand. He too was cut down to chum, and both Ponaturi's satchels were ransacked for their pearls. Dak cut off all their hands, and this is where the session ended.

"We didn't even get any loot off of that bitch!"

--Innominus, referring to the Thoopshib slaying in Session 43

DM's Notes
Scheduling-wise, we have switched from our previous Monday evening gaming night to regular Thursdays -- but aligning everybody's schedules is no easy feat. For the next few sessions, Uncle Junkal's player will likely show up a bit late (maybe 30-40 minutes) due to a work conflict. Yet this was literally the only weeknight we could find that worked for everyone. Thankfully, after the present academic term, his schedule will likely change -- of course, so will many of our other players, since many of us are in the college teaching profession and our schedules shift each term.

Other than that, I am thrilled that the party has found potent nemeses in the Ponaturi, and seem to be preparing for some kind of all-out raid or assault on their territory. There have also been some recent out-of-game discussions about possible other plans -- at least some tentative ideas I've heard mentioned by a couple of players -- so, as always, I will look forward to seeing what surprises the party brings on next.

Here are some screenshots from Skype:

Uncle Junkal's player at Carl's house.

Spawn of Endra, now on the East Coast.

Hazel's player, clearly enjoying herself as Hazel slays Ponaturi.

A new mascot for our enterprise, provided by Yor's player.

Clerics and Detection, PART 1, or "If You've Stuck Yourself in Heal-Bot Mode You've Got Your Own Damn Self to Blame"

2011-10-25T12:00:00.001-04:00

Thus does pronounce The Spawn of Endra!

[Okay, here's my Cleric cred, right off the bat. I've been playing the Cleric Innominus the Follower of Endra in Carter's game since January of 2010. I've read all the LabLord and AEC rules about Clerics closely, I compile all of Bat's Ancient Vaults and Eldritich Secrets Divine Spells, and I think about how to use my PC to do more interesting stuff all the time. Because of this, I am biased toward the view that Clerics are Bad-Ass.]

There's been a bit of a "Clerics ARE Bad-Ass" vibe going on in the blogospheroid, between Carter's last post on the subject and this one at Grognardia that really didn't have much to do with Clerics initially (it was about a Rients post on class generation). But a segment of the comments on Grognardia boiled down to the relative merits of Clerics, and how they are perceived by some as just heal-bots that no one wants to play. I made a comment there that was perhaps more abrasive than is appropriate for a Canada-based blog (just kidding, Canucks! I know you're not as civil as everyone thinks!):

Quoth I: As a person playing a LL cleric for the last year and a half, I have to say if your cleric is turned into a heal-bot, or never gets to fight, or never uses all the really useful detection spells to make yourself like f'ing Van Helsing then a) you suck as a player, b) you play in a pretty sorry game, with c) other pretty sorry players. If you can't make a B/X cleric awesome and fun, you've got serious problems.

Maybe that's harsh. A commenter suggested that they have a hard time elbowing in to get their way in a game ... and so I guess they get pressured into not fighting and just healing folks. Some folks suggested it's the MMOs that are the problem. Others said it goes further back. Well, I'm sorry but ... well, what I said. Something SUCKS: you, the GM, the other players, the gestalt of all that. B/X/LL Clerics are bad-ass and a lot of fun to play. They don't suck. Some human element of your game sucks.

Clerics apparently are terribly boring in later editions of D&D. I haven't played those editions, but I get that impression from such posts as this one at Rule of the Dice. There I read this rant, and I commented thusly:

Ahoy. I play a cleric in what are essentially B/X rules.... I'm not savvy with later editions, and have no opinions about their mechanics. But for the earlier editions, the magic isn't super spectacular, but the cleric whips ass in combat compared to many other classes (outside of fighters, of course). Yes they can cast Cure Light Wounds, but this idea that they hang back and offer first aid like M*A*S*H doesn't happen in play.

Is this a common thing in 3.x or later that the Cleric ... just ends up being a first aid kit? That's not my experience ... yes, there are times where my character heals a bunch of folks, but it's after my character crushed several skulls in a series of withering flail attacks.

And CDGallant_Knight (the author) responded:

Back in the "old days," clerics were the second-best option for combat, after fighters. (They had to do something once they ran out of spells, after all). The recent addition of so many other classes with specialized attacks and damage-dealing options, however, makes what little combat potential clerics had obsolete. The clerics are there to keep the strikers/DPS characters alive, so they can keep pouring on the damage.

And I said "Well, yeah then that DOES suck." (NB: I'm so old-school I have no idea what 'strikers/DPS characters' are, though I get the drift.)

But I'm not playing that edition. When we first started the Lands of Ara campaign back in January of 2010, I recall Carter mentioning that our party might want to have a Cleric, or even his setting-specific Sword Cleric of Frey, on board, and I took this off-handed remark to heart. I assumed he had some undead-heavy stuff planned. And I also was being that sort of "responsible player" that is alluded to in the Grognardia post comments: somebody has to be the stupid cleric or else we can't play, I'll take one for the team. But my motivation as one of two experienced gamers in the group with a bunch of almost total RPG newbies (two of whom choose to be house-ruled Bards off the bat ... humanities grad students!) was to make sure we were a well-balanced party, because I wanted the campaign to succeed at gaining and keeping new players and giving them enough time to figure out the game through play.

I NEVER played Clerics back in the day and I assume that it was because of all the god-damned (as it were) tonsured monk-looking fools with crosses and rosary beads that were depicted. And not having a spell at first level in B/X also seemed sucky (a topic well-treated in Rients' post and on Grognardia, and in Carter's last post). And no edged weapons. They seemed sucky, but now I know they weren't. The Lab Lord Cleric borrows the AD&D spell progression for the class, and so another layer of potential suck has been stripped away.

Before I get into the detection stuff, which is the point of PART 2 of this post, I'll touch on a few things that make Clerics play really cool. Many of these are not new ideas but there are enough *^$*)$#@ers out there crying about Clerics sucking that they need repeating yet again:

The blunt weapon restriction isn't that severe. In most B/X-style play you've lost only lost rare d10 weapons, d8 one-handed weapons, and d6 missile weapons. If you're JB and consider variable weapon damage optional (as written), it's almost completely an aesthetic choice.
They aren't ^&@#@ing priests telling everyone to be nice and turn the other cheek, and they aren't paladins with a boring moral absolutism that has almost no place in a party of killers and looters. They are trying to destroy evil or chaos or whatever in the world. By smashing its fucking skull in with a blunt object. And with righteous fury, I would expect.
They have access to all spells of the level they are able to cast each day. This is really important. As Carter has noted, this was one of the first insights I had about the cleric when I got back into the rules. Clerics don't have to find scrolls or buy spells to gain magic. They don't HAVE to slect CLW as their first spell (as opposed to MUs that logically really HAVE to choose Sleep as their first spell after Read Magic, since they are so weak in combat). They just have to pray and do what their deity wants (i.e., destroy enemies of the faith with righteous lust ... duh, what else were you planning to do?).
This means that Clerics are in a better position day-to-day to assess what sorts of spells will be useful in the adventure scenario, and are able to move the game forward in the non-combat sessions when detection is going to be more productive than healing or offensive spells. It's powerful because the Cleric never incurs long-term opportunity costs for selecting a 'lame' spell over and 'awesome' spell, like Magic Users might. You select spells for the day, if they aren't useful, so what? In fact, the ability to choose each day promotes experimentation and creative application of the spells because there is no long-term commitment to keeping those spells.
The ability to customize the day's spells to suit the gaming situation (especially if you're using the AEC Wisdom bonuses too) means that around 3rd level and higher, the Cleric's player has a lot of strategic options to consider, whether they are going to be Abu Nidal jihadist or Christopher Lee Van Helsing that day. Nobody else gets that flexibility. And in my experience that is really FUN. At times this can put you in the party's driver's seat, but just as often you get to do your bad-ass thing while the other party members do THEIR bad-ass things and it's like the A-Team just showed up to save Prince Arkus from demons from Hell!

Next time I'll talk about my favorite daily spell lists for Cleric Detective, as well as for Cleric Holy Warrior. For now, let me re-emphasize that I play my Cleric for me,and though I have a sense of trying to support the whole party, I don't put it up to a vote what spells I'll choose for the day to help everyone else out. Van Helsing wouldn't. He's trying to save reality, not save Dungo the Fighter with a +2HP CLW so he can swing his sword one more time. Seriously, folks. Clerics have have bigger fish to fry.

LL Cleric = Powerful (and well it should be)

2011-10-22T09:32:00.001-04:00

I ran my first ConstantCon game on Monday (play report forthcoming), and since we use Swords and Wizardry White Box rules for that, I got to talking with Spawn of Endra during the session about the relative power of the Cleric class across several D&D rules iterations and their retro-clones. It turns out that 1e AD&D and Labyrinth Lord favor giving clerics spells at first level, a privilege denied them by other systems like White Box, Swords and Wizardry in general, the LBBs, Holmes, and even Moldvay/Cook, upon which LL is primarily based!

Even James Raggi's LotFP Grindhouse, which has sparked much of my recent thinking on this matter, slightly de-powers the cleric from its LL / AD&D heights, NOT by denying clerics a spell at first level, but by making their Undead Turning ability into a spell. I think that is a very clever approach, and yet as I step back and reflect upon this whole cleric scenario, I find that in the end, I may actually prefer the "high-powered" cleric of LL and AD&D.

Why?

Well, this current campaign of mine is really the first time I have ever gamed with a cleric for any sustained period of time. I never realized how cool and versatile a class the Cleric was until this campaign. I will leave the particulars of my positive cleric experiences to our group's play reports and possibly Spawn (I am hoping he may eventually post on "The Cleric as Detective"), but I do want to note here why I think that clerics SHOULD be powerful, SHOULD get spells at first level as well as their Turn Undead ability.

It really boils down to their alignment, to whose team they're batting for. As I have recently outlined,

"All clerics, unless they serve demons or chaotic demigods, are aligned with Law. [. . .] Law is what 'naturally' occurs in one's home dimension, including its 'indigenous' gods, and Chaos always comes from without, crossing into a foreign dimension via the energies of Chaos."

So Lawful clerics worship the gods local to this dimension, the so-called "True Gods" or even "Lawful Gods" -- though recall that, at least for me, deities are NOT bound by strict alignment guidelines -- so it follows that their magic should flow more easily and "naturally" here than do the arcane forces of inter-dimensional Chaos. Clerics play by local rules and accrue benefits therefrom. Magic-users tamper with inter-dimensional forces and so should have a harder (and more dangerous) time of it.

May the Arandish gods bless Dan Proctor for going with the slightly more potent AD&D-style cleric for Labyrinth Lord. I can see why some folks prefer the lower-powered OD&D cleric -- for tradition's sake, or because of the "prove their faith before being granted the ability to work miracles" angle -- but I think that, now that clerics and the Lands of Ara have finally met, the spell-at-first-level-having, undead-turning cleric of Labyrinth Lord suits my campaign's (developing and evolving) assumptions quite well.

The Funk Bard David Snell: Giving the Party Bonuses to Certain Activities

2011-10-19T21:23:00.000-04:00

Thinest Spawn McSays:

I was minding my business about Bards recently, since I got sort of burned out on the 2d6 Bard, and I think Beedo and Carter are onto a good thing with the LotFP Specialist Bard. And I'm not against bards fundamentally. I started up a new character in the ConstantCon session the other night, Chundarr the BardBarian. He's an S&W fighter, and since he had no cash he doesn't even have an instrument. But that's the fun. How do you have a Bard when there's just no such thing as a Bard in the system and you're not going to make one up? What a quandary!

No quandary at all, says I! I'm just going to play him as a Bard and be as bardly as possible in every fight and the bonus is not in PC morale or to-hit bonuses, but in human-being player morale, a.k.a.: fun, laughter, camaraderie, nonsense, a good time. I spent a great deal of time in the last session thrusting a giant bat carcass on a stick in the faces of our foes, which is in-game barbaric and meta-game hilarious nonsense. I daresay it was BardBaric. Chundarr is learning to be a taunting monster puppeteer. We don't need rules for that. I don't anyway.

At any rate, there's this outstanding question in the blogosphericon about how a Bard playing a harp (or lute or whatever) can inspire anybody in a fight. Well, this may not be fight music, but this guy David Snell has the range that your classic Bard Harpist would need to be a real bad-ass. Check it out:

Maybe this works better at the tavern than in the dungeon, but even so he's not messing around with that harp.

Evil Gods and Summoners

2011-10-18T08:10:00.000-04:00

I like evil gods. I like them a lot.

This is, in part, why I am immensely appreciative of James Raggi's discussion of alignment in his LotFP Grindhouse rules, about which I have mused at length before. The main idea is that Law and Chaos are palpable cosmic forces affecting the game-world, not just moral abstractions. So almost everybody in the human and demi-human species are neutral. Demons and the undead are aligned with Chaos, as are those who meddle in the arcane arts (which could simply be called "chaotic arts"). All clerics, unless they serve demons or chaotic demigods, are aligned with Law.

In some ways, this Law/Chaos business all ties back to the presumption of a multi-dimensional universe and the possibility for inter-dimensional travel: Law is what "naturally" occurs in one's home dimension, including its "indigenous" gods, and Chaos always comes from without, crossing into a foreign dimension via the energies of Chaos.

Again, I did not really make this up on my own, although it makes a lot of sense to me. I am once again indebted to Mr Raggi, who succinctly describes arcane power thus:

"Magic fundamentally works by ripping a hole in the fabric of space and time and pulling out energy that interacts with and warps our reality. Various mages have managed to consistently capture specific energy in exact amounts to produce replicable results. Spells.

"The Summon spell opens the rift between the worlds a little bit more and forces an inhabitant into our world to do the Magic-User's bidding. What exactly comes through the tear, and whether or not it will do what the summoner wishes, are unpredictable."

[from the Summon spell description on Grindhouse Rules and Magic pg. 142]

This description fits perfectly with the core assumptions about how magic works in Ara. We have always included summoners as part of the Lands of Ara setting, and acknowledged in our own original writeup how dangerous Summoning could and should be. Summoning is a major part of what attracts demons -- i.e., Evil Gods -- to Ara in the first place. That is why it is technically an outlawed Art in the Lands of Ara now.

Yet Summoning surely still persists. Hell, the PCs in my current campaign are hot on the trail of some demonic entities that seem to have access to Summoner-created dimensional gates of some kind!

On a practical note, I wonder if I should technically make Raggi's Summon spell available in the Lands of Ara setting? Seems logical. . .

Beedo Gives Sage Advice

2011-10-16T09:40:00.003-04:00

I think Beedo over at Dreams in the Lich House has been on quite a roll lately -- his posts have been getting me all jazzed up and inspired. His latest one, which constitutes the debut of a new regular feature called "Saturday Sage Advice," considers the use of encounter tables as the very definition of a campaign setting.

This is a subject I remember Zak blogging about, talking about how we should describe our settings "in the form of rules (and monsters and items and all that) and nothing else." In other words, as Zak so eloquently puts it, we should "build the fiction out of the tools you give us to run it." I like that idea a lot.

Beedo does too, celebrating collaborative setting generation wherein "details emerge organically through play at the table and no mind-numbing info dumps are necessary. Players learn details only as they become relevant." Indeed!

James Maliszewski has commented on this idea before, including back when he discussed his original intentions for Dwimmermount, stating that "Dwimmermount is explicitly an experiment in seeing how both rules and campaigns develop organically through play. [. . . ] The setting[s], like the rules, are living things and they grow best in response to stimulus, not by being force fed."

This sort of stuff has been on my mind lately due to my decision to abandon the megadungeon project on the grounds that it was being "force fed" rather than organically grown through play. In the same post in which I announced the megadungeon's temporary cancellation, I mentioned my interest in other projects such as the Lands of Ara Compendium 2011 (due early 2012) and The Tower of Death (due 2012) -- both of which HAVE grown through play. That is why they remain viable.

Even more recently, I have begun to talk with Spawn of Endra about a future project called The Lands of Ara Gazetteer, and this is where the "build the fiction out of the tools you give us to run it" ruminations really come into play for me. I have already written text blurbs about many of the key regions of the Lands of Ara for this blog (see Gazetteer hyperlinks on this page), and see no reason to repeat them in a more formal Gazetteer. No, our Gazetteer may have some very short text blurbs for each region, but it will mainly consist of encounter tables, maps, NPCs and monsters, and all that usable, gamable stuff that would allow people to play adventures in the Lands of Ara. That is a superb game product design principle, and I thank Zak and Beedo and James M. for reminding me of its importance.

In fact, thanks are due to all the various OSR Sages who have helped me improve my game, as well as the ways in which I share it with the public. The RPG projects that are flourishing over here at Lands of Ara Enterprises are the ones that have grown out of the insights I have gained interfacing with the OSR blogging community and playing Labyrinth Lord these past couple years. I literally could not have done any of this without you!

And best of luck on the new regular column, Beedo. I know I'll be tuning in.

Session 44: Temple Desecrators-R-Us (Part 2 of 2)

2011-10-15T10:33:00.000-04:00

This part of the session, a continuation of this one, included PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Yor (Dwf 5), Dak (Dwf 6), Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 4), and Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard 4).

Underneath Kaminster's Country Manor.
Map scale = 20' per square.

This concluding part of Session 44 started right near the end of recently killed and subsequently raised Dak's two-week recovery period, roughly Days 161 and 162 of the party's Arandish adventures.

The still-mobile members of the party ventured back down the 500' shaft a few times during Dak's recovery time, to have Viv do x-ray searches of the various rubble piles and to collectively perform such excavation operations as could be safely conducted. Thereby were recovered a few more items of interest, including a note reading: "Dearest Bobby -- Keep the faith. --Sir Reginald"

In related news, Innominus cast Tale of Death on the skeleton he and Dak had earlier excavated from a rubble pile in the caverns far beneath Kaminster's Country Manor. He learned that the fellow had died by being ripped to shreds by three saurian Balrogs named Gor, Threk, and Zorchl*.

Meanwhile, Yor sent a letter north to his relatives in the mountains west of Farn Junction, hoping to obtain news about the fate of the supposedly plague-ridden city. After a few days wait, Yor's relations reported the worst: yes, there seemed to be a deadly plague sweeping the walled town. The malady was known locally as "the Dark Plague" but Yor's dwarven cousins hadn't seen any actual cases in person; they were staying the hell away from the town and the roads.

The day of Dak's restoration to full health, Day 163 of the party's Arandish adventures, the whole group returned to what was left of the Temple of Thoopshib. Innominus inserted a gold coin (1 gp) into the slot at the base of the (now demolished) altar. The coin instantly vanished. The cleric then cast Locate Object and sensed that the coin was now far away beneath them, more or less directly downward from their present position.

So Innominus next cast dispel magic on the Thoopshib Temple's eastern exit door, green sparks shot everywhere, and the door opened. The party proceeded along a 40' eastbound passage to another door marked with the Thoopshib fish-head glyph. Dak hand-axed this glyph, only to be zapped by green sparks and knocked a pace back by the potent electrical charge. So Innominus deployed his second dispel magic spell against this magically warded door, which opened, leading into a circular chamber almost 60' in diameter.

Viv inspected the whole place with his x-ray vision, and discovered that the circular room was in fact a cylindrical elevator car seated within a slightly larger (60' diameter) shaft. Through the three other Thoopshib-glyph doors, he saw a passageway (north), a small control room with knobs and four levers (east), and another passageway (south).

The session ended with the group standing in the elevator room.

--
* The "chl" at the end of Zorchl's name is an approximation of a letter (and pronunciation) with no direct equivalent in human language.

LotFP Specialist = The Future?

2011-10-14T15:50:00.001-04:00

Inspired by Beedo's excellent take on the Bard, I have lately been oohing and ahhing over the LotFP Specialist class (described on pp. 10-11 and pp. 30-42 of Grindhouse Rules and Magic). As Spawn of Endra comments on Beedo's blog, the latter's graft of Bardic skills onto the LotFP thief-substitute "points the way towards using the LotFP Specialist in new ways."

Indeed, to me the implications are quite clear: we should use LotFP's Specialist as a "conversion kit" for any custom class (or so-called "Advanced" class such as those in the Advanced Edition Companion) that we want to bring into our Basic D&D-ish games. As Raggi himself puts it on p. 71 of Referee,

"Assassins and Bards are Specialists. If the adventure or supplement text mentions specific power that these classes might have in other games, just grant it to the particular NPCs."

What Raggi suggests we grant to particular NPCs could be used, as Beedo has ably demonstrated, to streamline the process of bringing oddball PC classes like Rangers, Bards, and Jongleurs into the mix of our campaigns. Need a sea pirate with sailing skill? Make Sailing a Specialist skill and make Sailors Specialists.

Using this logic, I could port the Delving Deeper Bard over to the LotFP Specialist paradigm -- or, I suppose, simply steal Beedo's Bard. I would also like to graft Ranger skills* like Tracking onto the Specialist chassis:

Tracking - "Familiar with the signs left by humans, humanoids, and various other creatures as they make their way through the wilderness, rangers can discover and follow the trail of those they are pursuing -- sometimes even in the worst of conditions."

So the standard Ranger (according to Brave Halfling) would have points in Tracking, Move Silently, Hide in Shadows, Bushcraft, and Hear Noise. Any Ranger wanting to take the "Damage Bonus" option instead of the "Additional Skills" option (see Delving Deeper: Ranger) -- I've been using the former to represent northern Achelonian monster fighters -- could simply spend one of their initial allotted skill points to gain that ability, maybe swapping out Hide in Shadows and/or Hear Noise and instead spending a point to get that damage bonus vs. evil humanoids and giants.

Under this system, the standard LL thief would simply be a Specialist who spends points on Pick Locks, Find and Remove Traps, Pick Pockets, Move Silently, Climb Walls, Hide in Shadows, and Hear Noise.

After chucking in the Bard and Ranger skills, and changing some of LotFP's thief skill names back to their Labyrinth Lord equivalents,** my custom Specialist Skill List would look like:

Architecture
Bushcraft
Climb Walls
Find and Remove Traps [EDIT: Tinkering in LotFP]
Hear Noise
Hide in Shadows [Stealth in LotFP]
Languages
Lore [described here]
Move Silently [Stealth in LotFP]
Open Doors
Performance [described here]
Pick Locks [Tinkering in LotFP]
Pick Pockets [Sleight of Hand in LotFP]
Search
Sneak Attack
Tracking [see Delving Deeper: Ranger or description above]

It is too late for me to make the LotFP Specialist conversion in my current Labyrinth Lord campaign, because it would seriously change the nature (and , I think, potency) of our home-brewed 2d6 Bard class, currently active in play. But one day, after the current party retires or dies (TPK!), maybe I will run my NEXT Lands of Ara campaign using a more lean and mean ruleset, mostly using Labyrinth Lord but with the LotFP Specialist thrown in to replace all non-core custom classes including the standard LL thief. I would also be ditching all the AEC crap as well, except, perhaps, the expanded spell lists. But that is for . . . the future?

Labyrinth Lord is my lover. . . from Hell!

--
* I am stealing these Ranger abilities straight out of Delving Deeper: Ranger. Raggi's Bushcraft skill already covers foraging/wilderness survival (p. 33) as well as direction sense (p. 34).
** Thanks to Mr. Raggi for providing skill name conversion guidelines on p. 70 of Referee.

A Moment of Appreciation for Our Readers

2011-10-13T18:46:00.000-04:00

The Spawn of Endra says:

It seems that some of the bloggers I follow -- and they wouldn't necessarily call themselves "Old School", mind you -- are plagued with readers that are total dumbshits. Some of these IDIOTS even attempt leave really inane comments that totally miss the point, or proffer up little bits of shit about gaming like they just discovered gold. These bloggers read books, people! Get with it! You know how frustrating that can be. You ask, will anyone ever understand me? CAN anyone ever understand me? You write follow-up posts about how stupid everybody is.

Well, actually, I don't know how frustrating that can be. For some weird reason our readers don't act like idiots, and their comments are usually cordial and insightful. And I'm happy whenever anyone leaves a comment at all, to be honest. But maybe that's just my perception of things and I'm not skilled at identifying idiots. Maybe I'm an idiot! Hmm. Better reflect on that.

At any rate, if you're reading this, pat your self on the back for not being a stupid numbskull wasting my genius time with foolish comments. Good job! Please treat yourself to a cookie or beer or something. You've earned it!

Session 44: Temple Desecrators-R-Us (Part 1 of 2)

2011-10-12T08:37:00.004-04:00

"Well if that's the case, I go to town on desecrating this altar with my handaxe!"
--Dak the Younger

This session, played Monday 9/27/2011, included PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Yor (Dwf 5), Dak (Dwf 6), Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 4), and Uncle Junkal (Rodian Bard 4). While we missed Hazel, who checked in via Skype long enough to tell us she was too swamped with real-world work to join us, we were thrilled to hail the triumphant return of Uncle Junkal, finally back from hiatus after completing his doctoral dissertation. [Though he did arrive a bit late to the session so doesn't feature in the account of the first few turns.]

Underneath Kaminster's Country Manor. The Fish-Man Temple is the square room near top center. Map scale = 20' per square.

We started off just outside the weird Fish-Man Temple that the PCs visited (and partially desecrated, at least via pissing) last time. The group decided they hadn't had quite enough of desecrating the Temple, and ventured right back in. Dak approached the huge Fish-Thing statue/altar on the west side of the room and swung his New Steel handaxe at its base. A chunk of the thing, solid stone with shell inlay, came off at Dak's blow. The dwarf then delivered the immortal line that has provided this post with its epigraph, and started hacking away with great gusto at the Fish-idol, sending stone chips flying into the 2' of water that covered the entire Temple floor.

Meanwhile, Innominus searched around the Temple, while Vivuli kept his x-ray vision trained upon the underwater entrance to the place, right underneath the altar Dak was gradually demolishing. Yor kept his handaxe drawn and his eye on the door through which they had entered.

Dak kept hacking away, and as he reduced the fish-headed statue to rubble, Innominus noticed (via his still-active ability to detect evil) that the evil energy around the altar / statue actually increased as the vengeful dwarf bashed it to bits. Yor, inspired by Dak's exuberant example, started hacking away at the base of the southwest pillar, nearest the altar.

About this time Uncle Junkal the bard showed up, and, observing the mayhem ensuing in the Temple, readied a potion of gaseous form. He also attempted to read and decipher the etchings encircling the top of the pillar Yor was hacking down. Uncle Junkal was not able to read most of the strange runes, but one looked sickeningly familiar: it was the rune for Blibdoolpoolp, Sea Mother, a chaotic goddess whose name could not be uttered aloud without incurring dire retribution. Being a land of fisherfolk, most southern Arandish humans and all rodians were well aware of the taboo against uttering the Sea Mother's name. As a rodian bard, Uncle Junkal had been hearing terrifying tales about the lobster-headed sea goddess ever since he was a youngster. Without saying her name aloud, the bard conveyed to his fellows that the Temple must be sacred to (or at least partially dedicated to) the Sea Mother.

Innominus also made an interesting discovery during his searching of various areas of the Temple: the base of the altar had a small hole or niche in the front of it, about the diameter of a smallish gem or coin. With his x-ray vision Vivuli determined that this small niche went back 2" deep into the stone altar and stopped; it apparently led nowhere.

Dak had hacked the statue mostly to bits when he opted to take a break and plan his next move with partner-in-Temple-desecration Yor. The two of them began hooking up ropes and a block-and-tackle rig so as to be able to pull the pillar down upon the mostly smashed altar. During this brief break from wanton destruction, Dak also took a moment to poke a couple things into that small niche on the front of the altar: the end of a quarterstaff fit in the hole but provoked no effect; a gold piece slipped into it vanished completely! Even with x-ray vision, Vivuli could not see where the coin went; it seemed to instantly (magically?) wink out of existence.

Uncle Junkal did some more reading, visiting the door through which he and the party came in and attempting to make something of the fish-head rune etched there. Indeed, after racking his brain a moment, he came up with a name: Thoopshib. This was the name of a lesser water deity, a minion of Blibdoolpoolp's. The bard deduced that the Temple must be dedicated to Thoopshib worship, and realized that the statue Dak had just pulverized likely depicted the chaotic demigod.

The dwarves were on a desecratory roll: they pulled the southwest pillar down, toward the west, and it crashed into the altar, demolishing what was left of the statue, which wasn't much. The fallen pillar cracked upon impact but did not shatter or break; it now partially blocked the underwater passage leading west.

Once the pillar crashed down upon the altar with a bone-shaking crunch, a blackish energy began swirling around the area, swiftly materializing into a serpentine shape. The party leaped into action, Innominus casting Demon Bane right away as Vivuli and Uncle Junkal readied projectiles. Dak and Yor raised their handaxes and prepared to charge.

Over the next three rounds, the serpentine energy gradually solidified, coalescing into a gruesome creature with a long, slithery, eel-like lower body, four arms ending in slimy, tentacle-fingered hands, and a massive head like a horrible fish. It was twelve feet tall (would have been larger at full tail extension) and moved fairly swiftly around the watery chamber once it became solid in round two. It was greenish-black in color.

The first round of the fish-monster's solidity, it attacked: greenish slime shot forth from its snaky fingers, coating Dak and Yor from head to foot. The slime instantly hardened into a shell around each dwarf, rendering both of them immobile -- for now.

Vivuli applied black widow poison to an arrowhead, biding his time . . .

With Dak and Yor neutralized, Innominus and Gorgo rushed the grotesque fish-creature, swinging mace and dwarven axe. Their valiant offensive distracted the thing from its dwarven quarry, giving Uncle Junkal and Dak's follower Rodney a chance to reel Dak in with a rope and to begin chipping away at his slime-shell with a dagger. That technique seemed to work, though some of the slime chips that hit Rodney in the face burned him a little, as if the hardened slime-substance were acidic.

Vicious combat continued between the party and the fishy demigod, with Gorgo getting slime-shelled just about the time Dak got freed. Vivuli made masterful longbow shot with his poison-tipped arrow, rolling a "27" on his nightly d30 roll "to hit." However, I used my DM's nightly d30 roll for the creature's save vs. poison, and it survived!

Mobile again, Dak the Younger rushed into melee combat with the thing, going toe-to-toe with it for two or three rounds until it finally felled the dwarf with a vicious double-claw attack, for which I rolled the maximum damage (two 20's on 2d20!). As Dak died, he let off a long and extremely vile-smelling burst of flatulence, which, as his final gesture, he aimed in the direction of his fish-like killer.

Its vengeance partially sated, the eelish monstrosity went looking for Yor, himself finally freed from the slime-shell by virtue of his own brute strength -- after several tries, the powerful dwarf burst it apart from within.

Innominus and Yor pressed the attack, while Uncle Junkal made a remarkable handaxe throw, rolling his nightly d30 for damage and getting a "29." Nevertheless, the deity was still going strong, attacking Innominus.

Meanwhile, Vivuli had been hiding in the shadows behind the northwest pillar, and when the creature slithered close enough, baited by the embattled yet stalwart cleric, Vivuli sneak attacked the thing, making an assassination attempt! For that attempt he rolled "00" on his d%, and the gruesome fish-deity instantly vaporized in a burst of greenish-black energy!

The party's next immediate step was to head back up the 500' shaft to the Manor house, to see if anything could be done for Dak.

However, before leaving the Temple completely behind, Innominus cast Dispel Magic onto the altar area, including the top of the pillar. Green sparks shot out of the runes atop the pillar, and the cleric felt a wave of sickening nausea wash over him, and he saw -- or at least imagined he saw -- a vision of a terrible, humanoid female figure with a lobster's head and claws:

The Priest of Endra sensed hatred from the figure in the vision, and it "zapped" his mind, causing momentary, excruciating pain (and damage) to the cleric. Then it winked out. The somewhat dazed cleric joined his companions upstairs.

While the party had been underground, Father Azamondius of Kaladar had arrived at the Manor. Now, upon hearing of the party's brave deeds in eradicating chaotic forces below, Prince Arkus (still bedridden but improving) implored Azamondius to raise the fallen dwarf, offering a generous donation to the Kaladarian Temple of Carcoon in exchange for the service. It was done; after thanking the Prince, Dak was transported via wagon back into town, to recover at the party's rented home there.

The party puttered around Fortinbras for two weeks, waiting for Dak to fully recover. The snow continued to fall during most of that time, though not nearly as thickly as on the first day of the party's visit to the Country Manor. Uncle Junkal busked in the streets, Innominus healed the sick and diseased, and Vivuli used his street contacts to acquire a black-market version of the spell Conjure Vermin. The party also eagerly awaited the return of some scouts that Grand Vizier Krock had sent to investigate rumors of a plague in Farn Junction; they waited in vain.

More to come in Part 2 . . .

"Tales" Episode 1 on 10/17/2011

2011-10-10T07:00:00.002-04:00

"Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian" Episode 1

Date: Monday Oct. 17
Time: 6pm Eastern / 3pm Pacific / Midnight Berlin

No more than four (4) 1st Level PCs are sought for a dangerous and potentially lucrative mission. Roll a new 1st Level PC -- see this post for the standard Arandish options -- or consult the FLAILSNAILS Conventions for PC conversion guidelines.

Please email Sir Hobart of Delzar (aka Carter Soles) at csoles666 at gmail dot com to assure yourself a place at the virtual table -- first come, first served! The Hotel Kaladarian only hires teams of up to four adventurers, so don't delay!

As it says in the Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian Houserules Post, we are using the S&W White Box rules (Third Print Edition -- 25 November 2010) as writ with NO "Alternate Rules." The only two houserules being added (besides typical Lands of Ara class and race restrictions) are Shields Shall Be Splintered! and Critical Hits and Fumbles.

Online Venue Note: Despite my recent deliberations on the topic, I have decided to use Google+ for this session -- if you sign up to play and aren't yet a member, say so in your email to me and I'll send you an invite. See also these instructions.

My contact information on G+ is: Carter Soles, csoles666 at gmail dot com, avatar is me wearing glasses and holding up a white d30:

See also this announcement and this resource page for more information about Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian.

See you in cyberspace for some Arandish adventures on October 17!

I Joined Trollhalla!

2011-10-09T08:35:00.001-04:00

As regular readers know, Ken St. Andre's Tunnels and Trolls is a key part of my "gamer DNA" -- I was introduced to the game (by Michael Oshiro) fairly quickly on the heels of my earliest introduction to Holmes Basic D&D. I have spoken before of the game's many virtues and pleasures, and was reminded of them recently by ze bulette, who posted some great pics and a mini-review of T&T 7.5, an edition of the game I have never owned or played but about which I am very curious.

[Also, revisiting that aforementioned "virtues and pleasures" post of mine, I just noticed that Liz Danforth herself commented on it! And she's FAMOUS!]

All of this T&T-related excitement has led me to seek out Trollgod's Trollhalla, the online home base for T&T fandom. All it took was answering a few questions, and now I am on the path toward enhanced Tunnels and Trolls adventures and experiences! The coolest part of joining the Trollgod's Elite Champions is that the Trollgod himself -- legendary T&T creator Ken St. Andre -- is the site administrator! Yup, I got an email from Ken St. Andre! If you had told me when I was a fifth grader playing T&T that I would one day have direct (virtual) contact with the game's author, I would never have believed you.

Of course, as James Maliszewski has discussed before, the T&T game has stayed remarkably consistent over all these years, and it seems like part of this consistency stems from St. Andre's direct involvement: he has always kept himself accessible to the fans of his game, in ways that go above and beyond the average. This direct connection to the guru of the game system I'm playing is one of the great perks and joys of being part of our old-school hobby; this kind of personal touch doesn't seem a prevalent part of corporate RPG culture (e.g., WotC), though perhaps I misjudge.

At any rate, I have to go get to work on some material required for my deeper initiation into Trollgod's Trollhalla, and I don't really have much else to say here anyway except: T&T rules! And so do Ken St. Andre and Liz Danforth!

"Hey you! Git yer ugly mug out there and play some Tunnels and Trolls!"

Answering Jeff Rients' Twenty Questions (Part 2 of 2)

2011-10-08T08:30:00.001-04:00

This post is part two of a two-part series in which I attempt to answer Jeff Rients' list of "Twenty Quick Questions for your Campaign Setting." My first ten answers are here, and Jeff's answers about Wessex are available here and here.

So here is Part 2 of "Twenty Quick Questions for The Lands of Ara":

11. Where can I hire mercenaries?
Almost anywhere in the areas right around the Bay of Noffel -- i.e., the Free City of Kaladar, the Noffellian port towns of River's End, Silverhilt, and Jakama, and/or the Blintian bayside metropolis of Blintsport. In the north, your best bet is Tradefair or Ironcrown, though a certain number of B-grade mercs and swamp-lurking types are probably available in Swampsedge.

12. Is there any place on the map where swords are illegal, magic is outlawed or any other notable hassles from Johnny Law?
Arcane magic is outlawed in Noffel, upon punishment of exile (for the most minor infractions) or death (for everything else). And in general, as far as law enforcement goes, the Noffellian High Guard, the Kaladarian Royal Guard, and the Telengardian Roughriders are the most feared, manichean organizations in the Lands.

13. Which way to the nearest tavern?
I have blogged about this before, but now, thanks to the travels of my current PC party, I can happily add a few more entries to the list of Noteworthy Inns and Taverns of Ara. Here are some key establishments the PCs in my current campaign have visited during their adventures so far:

in Fortinbras

- The Drunken Yeti, the local adventurer's bar
- The King Hargon Inn, a reputable dwarven inn

in Farn Junction

- The Lazy Basilisk, an adventurer's bar
- The Stone Mountain Inn, a dwarven establishment

in the Free City of Kaladar

- The Orc's Balls Inn, a somewhat seedy establishment near the South Gate
- The Greedy Lion, in the North Wall District

In general, it is not difficult to find a drinking establishment anywhere in Ara, though many Noffellians tend to be restrained drinkers or even teetotalers, as are some fairly extreme Telengardians.

14. What monsters are terrorizing the countryside sufficiently that if I kill them I will become famous?
There is always Krakko the Iron Drake, who is so notoriously hated and feared that his death and killer would be celebrated forever throughout the Lands of Ara and beyond. More realistically, there is a greatly feared red dragon named Razgar who terrorizes northern Ara, a rumored Troll-King in the wildlands down south of Mizar, and many notorious hobgoblin tribes in the northeastern dwarven lands and in the central Minochian mountains. Lately, there seem to be a great many black dragons terrorizing central and southern Ara as well. And lastly, in the region of the Great Western Swamp, anyone who could exterminate a sufficient number of swamp trolls so as to reduce their deleterious impact on towns like Swampsedge and Sluggerton would be thanked, rewarded, and revered in that region for years to come.

15. Are there any wars brewing I could go fight?
Yes, the so-called New War between Delzar and Mizar, which is really just a long, drawn out border dispute, but no less violent or bloody for it: a great many Mizarian, Delzarian, and mercenary lives are lost to this longstanding conflict every day. At the opposite corner of the map, there are (rumored) skirmishes between elven and rodian forces taking place in the far northwest, near the western Arandish sea coast on the city of New Port. And of course, there is constant territorial infighting in many places throughout the Western Lands.

16. How about gladiatorial arenas complete with hard-won glory and fabulous cash prizes?
Arenas and gladiatorial battles (to the death anyway) are considered somewhat uncivilized in southern Ara, though there is a famous old arena in Highgate, nowadays only used for ceremonial purposes. However, there is a thriving gladiatorial circuit in the Western Lands and parts of Telengard: Ironcrown, Tradefair, and even Swampsedge all contain active gladiatorial competitions.

17. Are there any secret societies with sinister agendas I could join and/or fight?
The most noteworthy (or notorious) of these would include: (1) the Red Hand, a super-secret assassins' guild supposedly based in Kaladar, (2) the Invisible Hand, a secret society of powerful wizards who resist Arandish law, refusing to join the Council of Arlon, and (3) various dragon cultists, the most terrifying and evil of these latter groups being the one that worships the aforementioned Krakko.

18. What is there to eat around here?
This is the hardest one to answer, and it varies regionally. The lands immediately surrounding the Bay of Noffel, i.e., Noffel and Blint, serve a lot of fish and seafood; Blintian mussels are treasured throughout southern Ara. Minochians herd a lot of goats, but also grow various vegetable and grain crops in the areas east of the high mountains. The most lush farm- and grazing lands in Ara are in central Achelon and throughout Delzar, so practically any edible crop or form of livestock may be consumed in those Lands or in the Free City of Kaladar. Despite monster incursions, sheep are raised in many areas of northern Ara and the Western Lands. Telengard, consisting largely of blighted lands, depends upon local goat-herding as well as imported grain, fungi, and meat from the northeastern dwarves for its sustenance. Mizarians occasionally herd cattle, and when they do the meat produced is the finest in the Lands, but they mostly prefer to hunt large land mammals (tigers, oliphants, etc.) that roam the southern plains. And lastly, there have occasionally been unusual fruits and meats brought back by explorers of the southwestern Komar Peninsula, but none of these exotic offerings has yet taken a firm or consistent place in the culinary traditions of the Lands of Ara.

19. Any legendary lost treasures I could be looking for?
Yes, The Crimson Blades.

20. Where is the nearest dragon or other monster with Type H treasure?
Well, converting that "Type H" B/X / AD&D designation into a Labyrinth Lord Hoard Class using my handy-dandy Treasure Type Converter, I see that this query refers to creatures of Hoard Class XV, i.e., dragons and dragon turtles but not much else. So I would refer you to item 14 above, which is mostly a list of dragons anyway.

The Western Lands - Small Baronies Amidst Vast Wildlands

2011-10-07T08:00:00.002-04:00

I was looking over my Lands of Ara Gazetteer (available on this page) and came to a startling realization: I have never blogged about The Western Lands! I mean, I have mentioned them here and there, and my current campaign even started out on their southern frontier, but I have not yet composed a full-blown Gazetteer entry for the region.

So here goes:

The Western Lands refers to the large, western Arandish land area bordered by Noffel to the south, Aldoria to the north, the Great Western Swamp and Gray Mountains to the west, and the Achelonian border (i.e., the north-south Endyn Trade Route and Endyn River) to the east. It is an extremely loosely governed coalition (or maybe just collection) of small baronies and fiefdoms, some legally recognized by established Arandish powers (e.g., the many Achelonian petty nobles in the region), and many others whose sovereignty is hard to determine and exist mainly through force of will and/or arms.

[To continue, quoted from here:]

"The Western Lands are a loose confederation of independently held baronies and smaller land holdings that blur into the wilds of northern Achelon to the east and stretch toward the coastal Grey Mountains to the west. These are frontier states, untamed and raggedly governed. There is no central reigning power, only individual territories overseen by barons and baronesses ruling more or less as they please. Most of the barons wish to keep it this way, though there are a few individuals who believe it would benefit the region to unify into one realm. [. . .] I encourage players and referees to flesh out these lands to fit into your own adventure campaigns. Feel free to make up your own baronies and territories as you see fit, for this is a wild area ripe with possibilities."

The Western Lands - North

This is the slightly more densely populated half of the Western Lands, largely since the Great Western Swamp covers so much of the other, more southerly portion. Here in the north, despite the ubiquity of a good assortment of large, fearsome monsters including northern bears (stat as cave bears) and wild ogres (see stats here), there is plenty of verdant, wooded land, much of it suitable for ranging livestock. This is also where Tradefair, the single largest town in the Western Lands, sits [not indicated on hexmap, but it occupies hex 1107].

The City of Tradefair
Tradefair is a fairly large (pop. 9,600) free city that some call the "Kaladar of the Wildlands.” Though its permanent population is largely made up of Arandish humans, many dwarves, rodians, and even ogres live there as well, and its transient population includes persons of all races. It is the principle center for legitimate trade and commerce in the Western Lands. As in Kaladar, nearly anything may be bought or sold here. Tradefair supports a small spellcaster’s guild, and it is widely believed that the Invisible Hand has a secret meeting place somewhere in or near the city. The city of Tradefair has its own Lord Mayor and Guard Corps.

The Northwestern Baronies
Barony of Farrep
Rodgar, Lord Farrep, wants to keep the Baronies free. His is a reputable, hard-working mining colony on the western frontier of the wild lands. Along with Ngthar, Farrep is one of the two oldest Baronies granted by the Queen of Achelon, and Rodgar even rivals the Dukes of Orr and Anorak for being one of the richest and most powerful landholders in this region.

Barony of Ngthar
Murdock, Lord Ngthar, is owner of numerous highly productive mines, excavating ores used in the forging of dwarven steel. His exports travel east overland to the dwarven smithies in the mountains beyond Telengard. He is known to be extremely rich, though not seemingly interested in regional politics or power.

Duchy of Nostromo
Duncan, the Duke of Nostromo, lives at Castle Finnegar. The current duke’s father was an illegitimate though favored son of an Achelonian prince, so Duncan’s blood ties to Achelonian royalty are considered to be weaker. Therefore, the current Duke of Nostromo is not a particularly influential Duke, and he has been known to rabble-rouse and complain about this fact at gatherings of the local Western nobles.

Duchy of Anorak
This large expanse of rich farmland is held by Anorak, the eldest of two sons of the late Duke Orum, a favorite of the Queen of Achelon. When Orum fell into ill health nine years ago, he split his realm, giving land to each of the brothers. Anorak is also in the Queen’s favor, and is an Achelonian loyalist. He is fair and reasonable, though he distrusts Telengardians somewhat. Anorak has a son, Warro, who is a hothead and resents “queer Uncle Davidar,” whom he views as an obstacle to his own father’s rightful claim to all of Orum’s lands.

Duchy of Davidar
Davidar is a nature-loving man who, it is whispered, has connections with the Land of Aldoria. It is in fact widely reported that the Duchess of Davidar, Alnara, is an elf. Davidar’s interests keep him at a distance from the Achelonian courts, so though he is charismatic and powerful, and respected by his brother, Anorak, there are many Westerners who frown upon Davidar’s rumored association with faerie, and he is little known in Achelon.

Barony of Urn
A ruthless, mercenary landholder and miner, Lord Urn is vehemently anti-faerie, and is rumored to use Aldorian slave labor in his mines. It is also said that he sells his ore to Suhlian pirates on the western coast. Lord Urn is not fond of visitors and employs a violent, mercenary guard corps to defend his property.

Duchy of Orr
The Duchy of Orr is ruled by Herbald, a famous Achelonian general granted lands and title by the present Queen. Herbald is quite large and muscular and is known to be a deadly two-handed swordsman, even despite his advancing age. He is an authority on the lore of Noffellian Sword-Cleric Silverblade the Stout-Hearted. Some of his minions include Sir Ronald Glastonburg, his personal vassal and commander of his troops, and Ooochh, a domesticated rock troll who is utterly loyal to the duke.

Barony of Needbo
The current Lord Needbo is a reclusive and scholarly man. Castle Needbo is an ancient structure, and the Needbo family is said to have been here since long before the Achelonian land grants. Some locals believe the Needbos are connected in some way with faerie.

Faldor’s Keep
Lord Faldor is a non-noble landowner thought to be friendly to the Arandish White Council. His keep lies on the eastern bank of the River Ngthar between the Barony of Ngthar and Castle Morko. His small landholdings and introverted personality keep him from much unwanted notoriety, and his location—just across the river from the dreaded Wosc Marshes (also called the Haunted Marshes)—does not encourage guests.

Wilkiss
Wilkiss is the name of a small shepherds' village as well as the name for the wooded area that surrounds it. Deep in the woods outside the village is rumored to dwell Crooql [pronounced CROO-koo], the mad hermit of Wilkiss. Crooql is extremely reclusive but supposedly knows a great deal about local legend and lore.

The Western Lands - South

Much of this region is described in my post about the Great Western Swamp, yet there is one other key feature to be described: Castle Morko.

Castle Morko
Mad Lord Morko is a strange and unpredictable man who prefers to keep outsiders away from his land, most of which consists of swamp. In fact, the vast bulk of the Marshes of Margoon, a known breeding ground for swamp trolls, fall inside Mad Lord Morko’s territory.

ConstantCon - Sticking with Skype?

2011-10-04T17:21:00.000-04:00

I have been gaming with my "home" Labyrinth Lord group via Skype for over a year now, and have grown quite comfortable with it. Skype seems to handle larger (4-5 participant) video chats relatively well so long as some of the participants use headphones for audio. [Actually, lately we have gotten away without even using headphones at all.]

My home Labyrinth Lord group: clockwise from top left, that's Spawn in Pennsylvania, Vivuli's and Yor's players in Oregon, Hazel's player in Wisconsin, and me [at bottom center] in upstate New York.

So as the mid-October start date for my ConstantCon Game approaches, I find myself wondering: to Google+ or to Skype? I know practically everybody else in the OSR blogosphere has been going gaga over G+ of late, and part of me feels I ought to use that for Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian since many of my players will be from that blogosphere and may feel more comfortable on G+. However, I did run a two-person test of G+ Video Chat with Uncle Junkal's player about a month ago, and both of us felt that G+'s video dimension in particular was far inferior to that provided by Skype. I already pay for Skype Premium ($8.99 [US] per month) in order to get access to Skype's Group Video Chat feature, so I could easily hold my ConstantCon games over Skype, so long as my players all have (or are willing to download) it.

Or maybe I should start with G+ Video Chat on a trial basis and then if I don't like it, I can always revert to Skype?

Any thoughts or suggestions on this matter from the blogosphere?

ConstantCon Has A Homepage

2011-10-03T22:42:00.001-04:00

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! ConstantCon now has its own homepage! You can find it here. I also have added a link to it on my own ConstantCon page, and have added it to my blogroll.

As Zak also just announced, he will continue to host his usual Wednesday ConstantCon posts for a few more weeks, in order to smooth the transition from his blog to the new one.

Rock on ConstantCon!

Abandoning the Megadungeon Project (For Now)

2011-10-03T08:42:00.001-04:00

Much earlier this year, I boldly announced that I was commencing a Megadungeon Project. While the plan I had for the dungeon's layout is a very good one, and the specific place in which I planned to develop it is a key location in the mythology of the Lands of Ara, I have found that I am indeed a true old-schooler at heart, and need to develop my megadungeon through play (like Dwimmermount), NOT via detailed pre-design.

In the early months of 2011, I did a decent amount of mapping, maybe two to three partial levels' worth, but then lost steam and kind of drifted away from the whole thing for several months. So here I am now, in early October, realizing that until a group of PC's gets anywhere near the place, I might as well "close up shop" on the project for the time being.*

This clears space in my schedule for a few other projects that I am excited to tell you about, including:

- Co-writing and -editing The Lands of Ara Compendium 2011, collected highlights of the gaming content from the Lands of Ara blog from its inception in 2009 until the end of 2011. The Compendium will be written and edited by Spawn of Endra and myself and will feature illustrations by some old-school favorites including Kelvin Green! The Lands of Ara Compendium 2011 will be released as a free, downloadable pdf in the first weeks of 2012.

- Running episodic sessions of Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian, my new ConstantCon campaign.

- Possibly getting a local old-school D&D [probably Labyrinth Lord] group going. As regular readers know, my attempt to get a Basic Dungeons and Dragons Group going at the local bookstore last month did not immediately pan out. I think my new tactic locally will be to simply get a small group gaming, whether it be at my own house or at that bookshop or at some FLGS, I don't care.

- Writing and revising The Tower of Death, a spruced-up version of the module I ran at OSRCon in August, to be made available in early 2012 as a free, downloadable pdf.

Stay tuned for more Lands of Ara updates!

--
* Reminder to self: when I pick up steam on the project again, remember to create a cool Megadungeon Project Binder.

Answering Jeff Rients' Twenty Questions (Part 1 of 2)

2011-10-02T08:26:00.001-04:00

Awhile back, Jeff Rients posted a list of "Twenty Quick Questions for your Campaign Setting," which he then proceeded to answer (here and here) for his own Wessex campaign. Inspired by his example, I will now answer those same twenty questions as they relate to the Lands of Ara, to the best of my ability, also in two parts. Here goes part 1:

1. What is the deal with my cleric's religion?
We are discovering that as we play. Some well-known and widely worshipped Arandish deities include Awra, the creator-sorceress; Frey, God of the Noffellians; and Aldor, goddess of the Elves. Innominus, my current PC group's cleric, has suggested that his own order, the Followers of Endra, are a smaller sect, possibly based in the Western Lands, but who (like all other religious groups in Ara) also have a Temple in the Free City of Kaladar. In general, as I have previously posted, "Adventurers in Ara can surely find temples to almost any god or worshippable thing within the walls of the Free City of Kaladar; but outside that city, full-blown temples to anything besides local deities or those entities specifically designated below are probably rare."

2. Where can we go to buy standard equipment?
Any small- to mid-sized town* in civilized areas of Ara would do.

3. Where can we go to get platemail custom fitted for this monster I just befriended?
The Free City of Kaladar. Maybe a few skilled armorers exist in towns with significant dwarven populations like Farn Junction or Ironcrown who could pull off such a task as well. Of course, no civilized Arandish town or village would allow you to bring your new monster acquaintance inside its walls!

4. Who is the mightiest wizard in the land?
The greatest living thaumaturgist in the Lands of Ara is Arlanni, current head of the White Council of Arlon. However, many Arandish folk believe that Awra herself still roams the Lands, sometimes in Gold Dragon form, sometimes as a human, even occasionally as a rodian. If these legends are in any way true, then the creator-sorceress would rank highest -- for she could surely blow Arlanni out of his booties any day of the week.

5. Who is the greatest warrior in the land?
Officially, whoever is the King of Noffel's current Champion and Captain of the Noffellian High Guard. But that would be a highly contested title, especially outside southern Ara. Usually the head of the Kaladarian Royal Guard is a major badass as well, and there may be other less well-known warriors toiling away in the monster-infested regions of northern Ara who have not been given their due in more civilized circles.

6. Who is the richest person in the land?
I am not completely sure, but I know that he or she surely lives in the Free City of Kaladar. Or possibly is a member of one of the older Noffellian families, or is an Achelonian noble in the Queen's favor who possesses vast tracts of central Arandish land.

7. Where can we go to get some magical healing?
Temples of the Healers of Carcoon abound in most central and southern Arandish towns and cities. Other local and regional sects may offer this service as well.

8. Where can we go to get cures for the following conditions: poison, disease, curse, level drain, lycanthropy, polymorph, alignment change, death, undeath?
The Brothers of Carcoon could do most of these things, but only in their Temples in towns at least the size of Farn Junction, i.e., Medium Towns or bigger (pop. 4,500+).*

9. Is there a magic guild my MU belongs to or that I can join in order to get more spells?
Yes, it's called the White Council of Arlon, and you MUST join it upon reaching name level, or else be hunted down by its (powerful) representatives.

10. Where can I find an alchemist, sage or other expert NPC?
Many good-sized towns in Ara may have such experts, but the larger the metropolis, the better. The Free City of Kaladar is a sure bet, as would be Highgate, the Noffellian capitol. The Delzarian capitol of Bilnhof is also well-known for its high concentration of sages and folklorists.

More Arandish secrets will be revealed in Part 2!
--
* See Labyrinth Lord p. 125 for settlement size categories.

Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian

2011-09-30T19:53:00.012-04:00

I hereby announce the inception of Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian, my new online-only ConstantCon Lands of Ara campaign.

Before I reveal some of the juicy details of what this entails, I need to acknowledge that the concept for the campaign is not my own: it is completely horked from the repertoire of a long-lost gaming buddy of mine named Scott Peoples. He originally ran a Hotel Kaladarian-based campaign back in the mid-1990s, albeit in a slightly different game system.* However, the general template I plan to use, as well as a few of the specific encounters in the series, are stolen directly from Scott. Consider this whole endeavor a loving homage to a very inventive referee and RPG'er. Thanks, Scott!

Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian

The Hotel Kaladarian is a famously opulent and exclusive hotel located on the central hill of the Free City of Kaladar, the largest human city in Ara. The various members of the party are out-of-work adventure seekers, perhaps desiring employment or amusement between missions in other territories. Seeing ornately printed signs in key areas around the city, they report to a nondescript office a few blocks from the Hotel grounds. They are met by Sir Hobart of Delzar, Escoffier's most trusted lieutenant, and are presented with the following information:

The Hotel's Head Chef Escoffier orders unusual creatures to be hunted so that he may create his highly exotic (and expensive) dishes. The Hotel makes a policy of hiring inexperienced teams to conduct simple missions into the wilds, thereby learning who are the best suited for this peculiar kind of work. Over time, the Hotel management weeds out the chaff and retains only the best, most skilled monster-hunters in the realm. The Hotel Kaladarian is the most exclusive lodging in the entire Lands of Ara, and has the platinum in its coffers to pay its contract employees handsomely.

Each mission (or "Episode") of the campaign -- hopefully to last a single three- to four-hour session -- is named for the recipe and/or key ingredient Escoffier plans to prepare and/or use in his latest dish.

Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian

Campaign Houserules

1. The campaign will use the Swords and Wizardry Whitebox Rules as writ with Descending AC and no "Alternate Rules" from the Whitebox rulebook(s). [EDIT: We are specifically using the Third Print Edition -- 25 November 2010.]

2. Available Classes: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Dwarf, and Rodian (Race-as-Class only, see below).

3. Elves and Halflings do not exist as PCs in Ara unless ported over from other campaign settings. [See PC importation guidelines in The FLAILSNAILS Conventions and in my ConstantCon section below.]

4. Rodians
Rodians are seafaring folk who demonstrate a distinct tendency toward sea piracy and con-artistry. Any rodian character may originate from the rodian home island of Suhl, located at the extreme southeastern end of the Bay of Noffel. Rodian characters may also come from any region available to Arandish humans, although rodians from Telengard and northern Achelon are quite rare. The majority of mainland-born rodians (i.e., those born anywhere other than Suhl) come from the Free City of Kaladar, or one of the Suhlian-governed coastal cities on Ara’s far western seaboard (e.g., New Port).

Rodians have many of the same basic abilities and follow the same Level progression as halflings (as Fighters, max. level 4).

Weapon and Armor Restrictions: Like human Fighters, the Rodian has no
weapon or armor restrictions.

Fighting Giants: Giants, ogres, and similar giant-type creatures such as trolls
are not good at fighting small creatures such as rodians and dwarves, and
only inflict half the normal damage against them.

Deadly Accuracy with Missiles: Rodians receive a +2 “to-hit” when firing
missile weapons in combat.

Near Invisibility: When not engaged in combat, Rodians can be quite
stealthy, making themselves hard to spot and moving in almost total silence, especially in urban locales.

Saving Throw: Rodians are somewhat immune to disease, and receive +4 on
saving throws vs. disease, including mummy rot and lycanthropy.

5. Shields Shall Be Splintered!
Shields provide the usual +1 bonus to AC. However, they may also be used to "soak" damage from a single attack, thereby reducing damage to zero. Soaking damage destroys the shield.

Shields may also be used against any attack that allows a save for half damage, such as a fireball or dragon's breath. In that case, the shield is destroyed, as above, and the save is considered automatically successful, thereby guaranteeing half damage.

For magical shields, each +1 enchantment bonus gives a 10% chance of surviving a damage soak.

6. Critical Hits and Fumbles
Any time a player rolls a natural ‘20’ on a to hit roll, it is a critical hit. Damage (before modifiers) is doubled.
Likewise, if a player rolls a natural ‘1’ on a to hit roll, it is considered a critical failure or fumble. Typically, this means the combatant hurts himself, drops his weapon, breaks his weapon, or just plain falls down – DM's discretion.

Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian

ConstantCon-Related Information

- Die rolling on honor system.

- It is assumed that the PC party must return to the Hotel Kaladarian at the end of each one-session episode, to collect their cash reward and reap their glory.

- The Lands of Ara "Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian" Campaign shall accept imported/converted PCs so long as they abide by the guidelines in The FLAILSNAILS Conventions.

- No PC shall exceed the assumed experience level of a given adventure session by more than three (3) experience levels; overlevel PCs are subject to the handicapping policies described in Article 4 of The FLAILSNAILS Conventions, to be rolled at the outset of the session. The assumed PC level shall be provided with each session announcement.

And In Conclusion . . .

- Watch for my first session announcement within the next couple of weeks, surely by the teens of October.

- See also this page for resources and information about ConstantCon and Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian.

[EDIT: ConstantCon now has its own homepage!]

--
* Crimson Blades of Ara, the homebrewed system designed by David Miller and me.

Session 43: Underground Exploration (Part 2 of 2)

2011-09-25T22:17:00.001-04:00

"Let's bring [Father Azamondius] down here, and feed him to the manta rays if he messes with us!"

--Yor

This is a continuation of the session report which began here. This session took place 9/12/2011 and involved PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Dak (Dwf 5), Yor (Dwf 5), and Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 3).

Note the scale: 20' per square!

After briefly checking out the large rubble pile at the end of the southeasterly passage off the manta ray pool chamber, the PCs decided to get the hell out of the tunnels for awhile. They headed back up the shaft to the Prince's Manor, to get some rest, pray, re-memorize spells, and so on. As they ascended, they posted Royal Guards in the Manor's cellar at the trapdoor covering the 500' shaft.

Before retiring for rest, Innominus and Yor had a brief discussion with Grand Vizier Krock, the recuperating Prince's principal adviser, about current affairs at the Country Manor. Krock mentioned Father Azamondius, the high-ranking Priest of Carcoon currently en route to the Manor all the way from the Free City of Kaladar, over a week's travel to the north.

YOR: Let's bring him down here, feed him to the manta rays if he messes with us!

KROCK: I am not suggesting that you become combative with the invited Priest, I am merely suggesting that IF the Temple of Endra would like to become even more closely held in the Prince's good graces. . .

INNOMINUS: But I have already intervened with Endra on the Price's behalf, saving his life! Is that not enough?

KROCK: Of course, we deeply appreciate what you have done, and you and your compatriots will always be welcome at the Prince's court. However, Father Azamondius of Kaladar is on his way, and as a high-ranking Holy Man in the region, he has a vested interest in associating his Temple with the Prince's reputation and power. It is a political consideration for him, and a matter of standing and rank. So if you wish to establish the clear presence of your Temple in the Prince's court, especially in the face of Azamondius, I suggest you contact your Temple elders and have them dispatch a higher-ranking Priest of Endra here forthwith. This is meant as no insult to your own holy gifts or standing among us personally, but merely as advice to you as the political situation around the Prince solidifies.

INNOMINUS: I see.

Despite his exasperation with such shallow political maneuverings, Innominus did ultimately follow Krock's advice and send word to the Temple of Endra in Kaladar, apprising them of the situation and suggesting they send a name-level priest to southern Minoch ASAP.

No sooner had the cleric dispatched the outbound messenger to Kaladar than an inbound runner arrived at the front door, bringing a leather parchment tube containing pages intended for Innominus, Priest of Endra. The documents were sent by Sister Fenway, Priestess of the Church of Achelon, Holtboro Diocese.

The parchments inside were three:

- a letter from Sister Fenway explaining that she and her collaborators had tracked the symbols on the necromantic coins to an old document of evil runes from their archives, a copy of which was enclosed; and that she had also provided a map to locales in northern Achelon where necromantic coins had been found

- a non-magical diagram of a set of magical symbols, a great majority of which appeared on the powerful anti-curse spell scroll Innominus found in the scroll case far beneath the manor earlier that day (see footnoted EDIT in Part 1)

- a map, showing Enhelm, Holtboro, and the graveyard where the PCs met the entranced locals and first found necromantic coins; the map also showed five other sites with coin icons, and, at the far west side of the map, across a swamp from the six coin sites, a castle icon with a sinister "death" rune inscribed above it

Yor and Innominus asked the inbound messenger if he'd seen Father Azamondius' entourage approaching or entering Fortinbras. He replied no, that the heavy snows of the day had slowed much road traffic south, and that furthermore, there were dark rumors surrounding conditions in Farn Junction. In fact, he said, the word on the road was to avoid the northern Minochian city at all costs. He did not know precisely why; yet he himself had chosen to circumvent Farn Junction on his way south from Kaladar.

YOR (to VIZIER KROCK): I suggest you send a few of your men as scouts to Farn Junction, to see what is actually happening there.

KROCK: You are so right, good master Dwarf! I shall do as you suggest forthwith.

The messenger then left, the PCs were given rooms in the upstairs west wing of the Manor House, and they retired for the night.

Next morning, the dawning of Day 150 of the party's Arandish adventures, saw them rise early, send word to their dwarven housemen in town to hasten to the Manor House bearing mining equipment, and then they set off back down the 500' shaft to the underground dungeon far below.

Once down, they immediately headed to the northern end of the manta ray pool room, and started excavating that cave-in in order to reach the northbound passage beyond. One hour of excavation gained them a small but safe passage through the rubble pile to the other side. On that side was a stone passageway with seaweed motifs etched into the walls. Down that passage about 40' was a stone door with strange symbols etched in it: what looked like a continuation of the seaweed motif, and a thing vaguely like a fish's head.

First, the PCs ordered their dwarven mining accomplices to head back to the 30' deep cave-in at the end of the southeastern passage off the manta ray pool room, and to start excavating that collapse. Then Viv and Yor readied weapons, Innomius prepared to detect evil, and Dak, new steel hand axe held on high, braced himself to fling open the "fishy" door.

As soon as he touched the door, Dak felt a strong strong, sweet feeling of adulation toward the fish-head symbol etched on the door-face; but he was able to mentally resist this urge, and he cleared his mind and threw open the portal.

Within was a large, square pool chamber dominated by four thick central pillars and a great altar and fish-thing statue dominating the western side of the room. The entire place was a 2' deep pool of water.

Innominus' ability to detect evil revealed that the central pillars and the altar / statue all radiated very strong evil indeed. Viv began examining the two other doors out of the place -- also etched with the seaweed-and-fish-thing design -- with his x-ray vision, and saw some of the spaces beyond: to the east, a passageway leading down to a circular chamber, and to the north, a passage that sloped down to a waterline and continued sloping down (and bending west) fully submerged underwater.

Then Viv turned his x-ray attention to the fish-thing altar, and noticed that the 2' deep pool was actually much deeper right beneath the altar, and in fact seemed to extend into an underwater passage behind the altar itself. No sooner did he notice this interesting feature than there was some underwater commotion from that quarter, and the PCs became aware that something was swimming through the water at lightning speed from beneath the altar, into the room!

Innominus quickly cast Prayer as the various PCs were attacked from the water by a group of hideous fish-men. There were seven of the swimmers altogether, but in the first round of fighting, Viv cast sleep and knocked one out cold, then Innominus held three more. With those four down, the party had little trouble hacking one more to death before the remaining two swam swiftly back the way they had come, under the altar and out of sight.

With that, the party decided to (at least temporarily) vacate the fish-men's temple, and withdrew from the room, though Dak was sure to prop the door open so he would not have to touch it again in order to gain entrance to the place. Also, Innominus pissed in the fish-men's pool.

As the cleric exited, he cast detect magic, and thereby learned that the pillars, altar, and door etchings of the fish-head all radiated strong magic (as well as evil).

Just outside the underground fish-man temple, on the morning of Day 150 of the party's Arandish adventures, the session ended.

DM's Notes
Fun session -- a lot happened! And much of what did happen was good, old-fashioned dungeoneering activities: lots of searching, exploring, sifting through rubble, carefully excavating rubble piles, and (right at the end) a little bit of melee combat. I like this kind of stuff.

I also like the previous plot intrigues that are finding their way back into play -- I find the information delivered from Sister Fenway of Achelon to be portentious. We will see, of course, what the players choose to make of it.

Lastly, two PCs leveled up at the end of this session: Dak leveled to Dwarf-6, and Vivuli leveled to MU-4.

Session 43: Underground Exploration (Part 1 of 2)

2011-09-24T11:01:00.006-04:00

"I think we should find a way to kick these manta rays' asses and rob them."

--Vivuli

This session took place 9/12/2011 and involved PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Dak (Dwf 5), Yor (Dwf 5), and Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 3). A lot happens in it, so I will break this report into two parts; this is Part 1.

The session began exactly where the previous one left off, in the chamber containing Morag's Gate. After discussing the possibility of using one of their other bone chits to reactivate the Gate, and despite Dak's professed willingness to be talked into enacting just such a scheme, the party ultimately rejected the notion of using the Gate again, and after spreading some dirt around on the floor surrounding the Gate, they withdrew from the Gate chamber and closed the huge iron door behind them.

Note the scale: 20' per square!

They returned east to the large circular chamber directly underneath the 500' vertical shaft coming down from the Kaminster Country Manor Secret Cellar. They then pressed on to the east exit from said chamber, heading off northeast along another natural tunnel. This one led to a natural grotto chamber with a pool on the west side. A pungent odor which smelled like combination of feces and sulfur wafted through this area, but did not originate from the pool. The pool was quite muddy and hard to see through -- even with Vivuli's x-ray vision ring!

The bulk of the north wall of the pool chamber consisted of a huge rubble pile -- as if that section of the chamber had at one time collapsed. Dak and Innominus immediately set about searching the rubble pile, while Vivuli checked out the pool and Yor searched the chamber's east wall.

Dak learned that the rubble collapse did indeed cover a prior section of corridor that lay beyond. Meanwhile, Innominus found a skeletal arm sticking out of one portion of the collapse, a leather scroll case still clutched in its bony hand.

Innominus touched the scroll case and instantly had a vision of himself kneeling in a temple, before a towering altar whose pinnacle was made to look like the sun, and verily it glowed as if it were the sun even though it was inside a temple. Also before him in the vision was a glowing sword, point-down, which he grasped as he knelt before the altar. The vision passed; Innominus let go of the scroll case and, saying a prayer to Endra, began excavating the skeleton from the rubble collapse, with Dak assisting.

Meanwhile, searching the pool chamber's east wall, Yor found a shard of night-black metal embedded in the stone of the wall, at about 5' height. This is the same substance of which is constructed the night-black mace the party found at the very end of Session 41 [though not yet mentioned in that session report].

Inspecting the muddy pool more closely, Vivuli was able to detect a few large, manta-ray like creatures lurking around the bottom, hovering over what appeared to be treasure: he glimpsed a chalice of white gold.

Once Innominus and Dak finished excavating the skeletal remains of the presumed Sword-Cleric,* the whole party got interested in Vivuli's manta ray pool. Yor chucked a medium-sized rock into its center; the rays momentarily scattered, regrouping in the furthest removed corner of the pool. This suited the party fine; they prepared grappling hooks and ropes and prepared to drag the various items of loot out of the pool one by one.

Innominus took a fancy to hook some of the dead flesh of one of the slain vulture-demons from last session onto a grappling hook and dangle it into the manta ray pool, presumably as some kind of bait. But the vile, sulfurous stuff repelled the rays, and they retreated even further back into the pool, so far back that most of the party (save Viv with his x-ray vision) couldn't see them anymore.

The party then chucked the whole demon carcass into the pool, to keep the mantas at bay while they looted the treasure. They got:

a chest with 6,000gp
a chest with 1,000pp
a chest with 3,000sp
a white-gold chalice bearing a Noffellian sword-and-sun emblem
a long sword in a fine scabbard with a Noffellian sword-and-sun emblem
a suit of fine plate mail, also with Noffellian sword-and-sun insignia engraved on breastplate

[Spawn says: Don't worry folks! My manta ray's alright!

And now back to Carter!]

They stashed the loot in their portable hole and headed down the natural passageway to the east. The stench of sulfurous feces became much stronger as they went east, and indeed, they soon came to a niche in the north side of the passage that apparently had served as the demons' crapper. There was a huge pile of blackish excrement there. For now, they passed it by, and followed the natural passage as it bent around ninety degrees to the north, terminating in a stout, wooden door. Vivuli's inspection revealed that the door was locked, and his x-ray vision showed him part of a large chamber beyond the door.

Viv attempted to pick the lock, to no avail, and furthermore, upon touching the door, a voice inside his mind boomed: "Get away from there, puny scumbucket!"

Yor then applied his +1 crowbar to the task, and, rolling a "19" for his "attack" roll vs. the door, he busted that sumbitch open. The party now beheld an unusual sight.

They looked into a large triangular chamber, with a huge (25' tall) statue dominating the space. The statue depicted a grotesque, vaguely humanoid yet betentacled creature, apparently with no eyes. It was like nothing the party had ever seen before.

The party spread out into the chamber, searching for traps and the like. Once they got round to the north side of the chamber, on the far side of the disturbing statue, they saw a metal door with no handles, centered in the long north wall. Viv noticed right away that his x-ray vision could not penetrate the walls of the triangular chamber, nor the northern metal door.

Dak approached the statue's base and inspected it. The statue was carved out of the living rock of the chamber, as if it was simply left here when the chamber itself was excavated. The workmanship was extraordinarily precise, if strangely artless. Dak also noticed some dried substance caked on the surface of part of the bottom of the statue; he scraped off a sample of some of the dried, greenish substance and stashed it away in his belongings.

Feeling nervous about Dak's probings of the unnerving statue, Viv retreated from the triangular chamber, returning to the excrement pile niche to (in his words) "x-ray demon poo."

Meanwhile, always the daredevil, Dak took out his new steel hand axe and poked it into the base of the statue. Surprisingly, the blade sunk into the statue's surface, penetrating about two or three inches in . . . until a voice boomed inside Dak's mind:

"HOW DARE YOU SACRILEGE??"

and the dwarf was suddenly blasted back twenty feet by a terrific blast of greenish electrical energy, injured from both the blast and his having been unceremoniously hurled to the hard stone floor. Though he wondered about it, Dak ultimately could not tell if the telepathic message had originated with the statue itself or was delivered from somewhere (or someone) else nearby. The PCs decided not to wait around to find out; they exited the triangular chamber the way they had come, shut the wooden door behind them, and joined Viv at the demon crap-pile. Sadly for the industrious assassin/mu, there was nothing to be found there.

The group briefly explored one other eastbound passage leading off the manta pool chamber, which led to a large cave-in about 30' down. Viv scanned the collapse with his x-ray powers, and saw that the rubble went back at least 30' deep. He also saw a (somewhat pulverized) Noffellian holy symbol about 9' deep under the rubble.

More to come in Part 2 . . .

--
* EDIT: After the excavation, Innominus finally did get a look at the scroll inside the skeletal Sword-Cleric's scroll case. It was an extremely potent scroll of divine magic, which Innominus sensed must be an anti-curse or curse-virus spell of some sort. The cleric of Endra also strongly suspected that the scroll was only usable once.

Self-Admonishments about Writing

2011-09-21T11:00:00.001-04:00

From the bowels of a dissertation shrieks forth the Spawn of Endra:

[Note: I write "fuck" and "fucking" a lot in this post, and reading that may not be your bag. Or it might be a jolly old time for you! How do I know?]

Sir Mortimer Wheeler telling it like it is.

Nothing really game-related to discuss, but I'm coming off of getting a dissertation chapter basically done -- one which was THE most horrendously painful piece of scientific writing I've ever done (and my CV is not short for a grad student) -- and having one of those serious "what the fuck is going on with you?" sessions with my advisor (this time he was asking me). So it's been a lot of highs and lows the last few days and weeks, and I'm coming into parts of my diss I enjoy better. But to keep my momentum in writing, I've distilled a few items that I need to keep in mind. I've seen a lot bloggers I respect mention some of these thing as they talk about their writing projects or process in general -- from the notorious Happy Whisk to that dandy of the podcast James Raggi the 18th. (Quick Quiz: One is the instrument of Satan and the other makes delicious baked goods -- which is which? Answer below*).

Some of these admonitions are more specific to my genre (academic writing on the boundary of social and natural sciences), and some are personal peeves. Mainly I just want to put these down to remind myself of what I hate about my own writing so I stop doing it. (This should all be in first person, but it's in 2nd person. Don't take this personally, I'm not talking about you.)

The Process: You've got to fucking sit down and write, or at least try to write, every fucking day that you scheduled yourself to. That is, you've got to be putting words on the page everyday, no matter how crappy they are, or if it takes all day to write one paragraph. Allegedly some days it comes easier than others, but if you don't force yourself to endure, the good days will never come.

The Only Good Dissertation Is a DONE Dissertation: This is probably the first, most succinct, and most accurate advice I've ever heard about writing a diss. Even so, I am still struggling to face the reality that this applies EVEN TO MY DISSERTATION. Can you fucking believe that, dear readers? Even MY dissertation is a piece of crap, after all these years of blowing people out of the water and being the smartest grad student archaeologist in the room. Wow. This may not be readily applicable, to say, writing your Fantasy Heartbreaker or your first old school module, i.e., it may just suck and that's not really good for the person that buys your product. Having a done module won't make it good, but the analogy is probably that you have to have the first shitty iteration of the thing before you can get on to doing something better. Somebody posted an Ira Glass quote about this a while back.

Fucking Times New Roman: I've written enough with Word that I'm used to Times New Roman font, but I have now officially grown to hate its look so much that I need to start writing in a different font. For a while it has just been background and corporate nothingness, but now not only does it evoke Microsoft and Bill Gates and his crappy glasses, it evokes the nausea and tension that have been the last several months of working on the diss. If you're writing a gaming product, don't use TNR, even if you're trying to emulate the LBBs or something like that. Or I will vomit on your game.

Useless Words I HATE: Archaeologists run the gamut in their ability to write either (in the words of the great Sir Mortimer Wheeler) "the driest dust that blows", or the most flowery obtuse garbage imaginable. Most lack the grammar or vocabulary to do the latter, and aren't empirical enough to do the former, and they fall in between the two. The ones aspiring to floridity (often those bumping elbows with Old World classicists, non-ecologically oriented Mesoamericanists, and art historians) or technicality (often those collaborating with hard scientists) will use words that sound good, but carry no weight. These I officially hate:

significant, significance, etc., for big, a lot, important, substantial. I vow to never use this ever again unless I'm talking about statistical significance. I worked on a paper with a friend whose first draft had 23 instances of significant. In your writing, keep an eye out for words that you keep using like that. They make you look stupid.
implications: Often a stand-in for just saying what the implications of your research are, and suggest significance ... ugh. Especially bad in titles and abstracts where you should just say the result, not vaguely allude to implications (which must be significant). [In the spirit of full disclosure, my first sole-authored journal article committed this crime.]
timeframe for timing or date of prehistoric events. Given how shitty your chronology is, you probably don't have a timeframe, but you may have a sense of the timing of an event. And the connotation is wrong anyway.
Bayesian when you really just mean you used OxCal to calibrate some radiocarbon dates. Taking a frozen burrito out of the freezer and putting it in the microwave does not make you a physicist or an engineer. Nor a cook. Running OxCal does not make you a post-classical statistician.
suggests, indicates, etc. Most archaeological evidence is ambiguous, or at least when we're interpreting cause and effect, we rely on induction more often than deduction and the problem of equifinality limits our ability to say "This giant obsidian blade stuck through this person's skull means that he was an enemy of this tribe and was killed in battle." Usually you could also say something like "It is possible this was the king of this tribe and the giant obsidian blade was ritually stuck in his skull as part of the renewing-the-earth ritual and he was the most beloved member of the dynasty." So the writing gets bogged down in "This suggests that ..." or if you feel more ballsy "This indicates that ..." or "This is consistent with ...", all of which are dull words that suck the life out of you as you write. It's very difficult to just say what your observations are in a confident way, without obsequious qualifications, but when you can it usually sounds more interesting. But you don't want to overstate your case and get shit upon. These words are probably the most intractable, but even so other ways of phrasing the ideas may help.

There are more, I just can't remember them right now. Oh, and Christ! ... Of course:

robust: Unless you're talking about a distinct group of australopithecines, then fuck you when you use this word. How is this used in the literature? To refer to one's own research design, data, analytical methods or theoretical framework. To the discerning reader it always looks like you're trying to cover up weaknesses in these things. Examples: Robust chronology-building. Fuck you. Robust inference. Fuck you. Robust set of ecological models for human decision making. Fuck you. Now lookit, I'm not saying all of your shit isn't robust. But why are you telling me in the background section a priori (and I know what that means because I know what Bayesian means, mf'ers) that all your shit is robust instead of demonstrating to me in the results and discussion that it is? If your methods and data are awesome, I'm going to know. If you keep talking about how robust everything is I'm just going to think you're insecure about your science or your genitals or some other part of your life. Chest-puffing looks like chest-puffing whether it's done at a bar or on the page. And equally likely to get you called on your bullshit (i.e., an empirical test of your robusticity).

Argh. Well, I guess I needed to rant about writing. I'm happy to hear anyone's take on this sort of BS, and especially good ideas in the process category and how you stick through the hard times.

_______________________
*HA! Trick question! The Whisk makes satanic, albeit delicious, baked goods.

No-Show Leads to Change of Plans

2011-09-18T16:46:00.001-04:00

Well, I showed up for the initial orientation meeting of my proposed Labyrinth Lord group at the local bookstore, but sadly, nobody else came. It may be that I have not yet established enough of a web of contacts in the local gaming community to attract prospective players. Or maybe there simply aren't enough local tabletop RPG'ers in the immediate area to sustain a local old-school D&D group at all, at least not on Sundays at 1pm at Lift Bridge Books. At least not yet.

In any case, this means a re-assessment of my next step is called for. I may re-attempt an Old-School D&D Group at the bookstore again in the future, but I need to regroup and re-prioritize a little bit first.

As I recently reported, there are a number of local game shops I have not yet set foot in. So that seems the next most likely avenue for exploration.

Especially promising in this regard is the recurring Retro Games Night at Pair-A-Dice Games. Maybe I'll just show up there on October 1 with Labyrinth Lord rules and The Lost City in hand, and see what happens.

The Cynidiceans want to kick your ass.

But most immediately, my plans include getting a ConstantCon game started. I will make an "official" announcement of this soon, and will advertise the first virtual meetup on this blog and on Zak's Wednesday "bulletin board" immediately thereafter.

"Tales from the Hotel Kaladarian" is coming!

Pound-O-Dice Revisited

2011-09-17T08:35:00.000-04:00

I was just reading Spawn's great pictorial account of the arrival of his very own Chessex Pound-O-Dice, and found myself particularly impressed with his shot of the lb. split up by die type. It had not occurred to me to depict my own lb. of dice this way, and since I have to gather those dice together for the first orientation meeting of my FLBS D&D group tomorrow, I thought I would pause long enough to take just such a shot or two.

Here is my Pound-O-Dice still in the bag, next to the case I plan to store it in for travel to Lift Bridge Books tomorrow.

Bird's eye view of the Pound, separated by die type.

I won't bother to do the whole mathematical breakdown, but it does look like the set strongly favors d6s and d20s, with a decent spread of d8s, d10s, and d12s, but I got short-changed on d4s: I only got two d4s in the whole set!

My two pink d4s.

Here is a pic of a few of the smallest d6s I got, with another d6 in the frame for scale. Are these the tiny ones you other guys are complaining about?

My menagerie of small d6s, plus their big brother for comparison.

And lastly, a couple of pics of my array of materials for tomorrow's meeting:

My dice in their case, including my special DM-only "Theo set" on the right there.

Adventure awaits the boldest and bravest of Brockport!

Another Pound-O-Dice? Yes.

2011-09-15T12:00:00.002-04:00

Ein Spawn of Endra quantifies it:

Like Carter, I also could not resist the sirens' song that is the Chessex Pound-O-Dice. I've got my favorite sets of dice for my own gaming purposes, and unlike Carter I'm not trying to run a public game, but this was not purely commodity fetishism on my part. Last week I was messing around with Zak's Quickie Small Castle/Fort Generator and since I was lacking in d6s, I had to mix in d12s, things went pear-shaped ... but that's another post. For those sorts of things I need more dice. Perhaps a Pound-O-Dice would suffice. Ah that reminds me of the extemporaneous lyrics to I Worship Satan:

I'd like to sacrifice some rice. Now wouldn't that be nice? Build a sacrificial altar on the Rock of Gibraltar. And I didn't even falter.

Anyhoo, here's the teaming horde I got for what you spend on a 6-pack in Pennsylvania:

There's some pretty cool dice in this set. Maybe I like colors that are not market-viable. Well, sucks to be you, Everybody Else That Hates These Colors! Why don't you buy another set $10 set of 7 beautiful dice to drown your sorrows in already? Having said that, I wasn't stoked on the (promised to be speckled) coherent set of dice included:

These are cooler than they look here -- the white groundmass is flecked with orange -- but you think they should glow in the dark and they don't. You're never really gonna love dice that should do something and they just don't do it. Seriously. But what the fuck, they cost me about $1.50 total. And I miss using the beautiful geological term groundmass.

But, heedful of a comment from the inestimable Kelvin Green, I broke this down a bit. Here are the dice sorted by shape (note the coffee mug/wine glass axis implied at the top of the image):

So yes, we're a bit light on the d4s, d8s, and d12s. And the dice aren't totally random, there are matches within types (though much less so between them). What I got:

d4: 7. 1 pair among them.

d6: w/ pips: 18. Incl. matching sets of 4 and 6. Officially cool.
d6: w/ numerals: 11. 2 pairs.
d6: w/ special '6': 4. 1 pair (check out WTF below).
d8: 5. 1 pair.
d10 (0-9): 19. 5 pairs.
d10 (00-90): 8. 1 pair.
d12: 5. No pairs.
d20: 19. 5 pairs, 3 triplets. Pretty much cool.

That is 96 dice total. I'd like more of the d4, d8 and d12, but I do like a bunch of these dice. The many pairs of d20s I have will serve me well when I construct my Dice Golem; as testicles (for him) or boobs (for her). Or both! Hell I've got 5 pairs!

So help. I've got two of these d6s and another with the same symbol. What is that? A dragon or wolf head? What game does this belong to? Rotate this thing around, I can't make any sense of it.

As I sifted through these dice and latched on to the colors that I liked the most I became more pleased with some of them. Then I saw how my favorite dice were congruent with one of my favorite albums, Stereolab's Dots and Loops.

At any rate, cheap thrills from the Pound-O-Dice.

Session 42: Morag's Gate

2011-09-13T15:54:00.001-04:00

"I'm the Steve Buscemi of dwarves."

--Dak

This session, played Monday 8/29/2011, included PCs Hazel (Ftr 4 / MU 4), Innominus (Clr 6), Yor (Dwf 5), Dak (Dwf 5), and Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 2). Hazel, having spent the bulk of last session unseen, began this session invisible as well. Since Dak's player wasn't here last session, we ruled that the dwarf had been out drunkenly tending the horses and War Wagon during last session's events, and stumbled in out of the snow just as this session got underway.

We picked up in the basement room where, having vanquished two gargoyle-demons, the party was now explaining to Grand Vizier Krock, Prince Arkus' chief aide, that he and the Prince had serious demon problems here at the country manor. As the following dialogue ensued, Hazel focused her powers of ESP upon the Grand Vizier.

Innominus of Endra (to Krock): You have demons setting up gates to infernal realms in your own cellar. How do you explain this?

Grand Vizier Krock: My staff and I never came down here -- nor did the Prince. We had heard from a member of the household staff who had served under the Baron that the cellar of the manor was haunted, and we felt it was best to leave such matters alone.

Hazel could tell that in his own mind, Vizier Krock believed the tale of a haunted basement and was genuinely terrified of the place.

Moving out of the gargoyle-demon room and down the corridor to the south, to the door from behind which Hazel heard clarinet playing last session, Innominus used his Detect Magic spell to determine that there was a magical energy engulfing the (now silent) clarinet player's door. Using his x-ray vision ring, Vivuli quickly determined that beyond the door lay a roughly 20' x 20' chamber partially filled with smashed and randomly scattered furniture remnants, and a single humanoid-seeming creature lurking in the back corner (see circled "x" on map) behind a rubble pile. Using her ESP, Hazel determined that this creature's mind was utterly fixated on a being it referred to as "the Master." Its predominant thought was that it "had to get back to the Master," although Hazel detected that it both strongly desired and simultaneously dreaded reuniting with this Master.

Hazel then used her ventriloquism spell to speak sentences into the creature's ear, including, ultimately, "the Master commands you to open the door."

Responding to this, the creature ran to the inside of the still-closed door and swung it open from the inside. For a brief moment, the party could see a tall, pale human-looking figure framed in the doorway, a certain nobility still conveyed in its bearing despite the pallor of its skin and a black blankness in its eyesockets. But then instantly, triggered by magic, a huge burst of fire exploded in the doorway, burning the creature to a crisp a split-second after it flung the door open wide.

Grand Vizier Krock: My god, that was the Baron!

The clarinet-playing creature had indeed been Baron Kaminster but was now caught in some kind of hideous, semi-undead state. To be sure he/it did not rise again, Innominus and Dak plunged a stake through its heart and cut off its head, while Vivuli searched around in the 20' x 20' chamber, finding a necromantic talisman like those the party previously discovered in an Achelonian graveyard at the conclusion of Session 37.

Having made this set of discoveries, the party next investigated the central, westbound corridor of the cellar level. A steady dripping sound came from that passage, and probing down the hall, the party found that the drip sound actually came from beneath a circular wooden trapdoor at the end of its 30' length.

Dak and Innominus pried up the trapdoor, and the party found itself looking down into an incredibly deep 6' diameter vertical shaft. Very dark. All the party's ropes were amassed, tied together, and lowered down the shaft -- at the 350' mark they had run out of rope but not touched bottom. Always a dwarf of action, Dak dropped an oil flask down the shaft and, gauging the timing of the impact and using his dwarven sense of underground architecture, estimated that the bottom must be at least 500' down. Upon its distant impact upon a solid surface far below, Hazel swore she faintly heard some low-frequency utterances (possibly grunts or growls) in response to the exploding flask's momentary flame burst.

More ropes were ordered brought to the basement from the Baron's stash, and soon the party was lowering itself, Dak-first, into the 500' shaft. Thanks to some words of encouragement (and shared snorts of dwarven whiskey) from the aforementioned Dak, three of Arkus' Royal Guards descended the shaft as well: Brad, Norbert, and Whiskey Pete.

At the bottom, the shaft opened into a great, circular domed chamber, roughly 60' in diameter, with two exits, one on either side. As soon as point-dwarf Dak lowered himself into the chamber, two hideous, birdlike demons half-leaped, half-flew at him, striking viciously with their vile claws. Fast, lethal combat ensued -- in the course of it, at least three PCs used their d30 rolls for damage against these poor demons. At one key point early in the battle, Innominus -- he was the second one down the rope -- chucked his holy water bolas at one of the demons, rolled a "28" for damage, thereby paving the way for Vivuli to pick it off the next round with a similarly deadly longbow shot.

The second demon fled, flying with uncanny swiftness down the westbound corridor. Hazel ordered her kestrel familiar after it, and lo and behold, the dang kestrel could actually outfly my demon! So it caught up within one round, intent upon dropping the elven vine net (looted in Session 33 upon my poor airborne demon who was just minding his own business and wasn't really bothering anybody when those pesky PCs came along.

Nevertheless, the demon almost escaped all but the kestrel's clutches when a portion of the tunnel roof collapsed behind it, filling up all but a small 3' aperture between itself and the rest of the (landborne) party in the natural corridor. But Dak charged ahead anyway, and his fellows joined in, shooting projectiles through the aperture at the fleeing demon -- to no avail. But then Hazel, deciding to act decisively despite the deed's negation of her invisibility, fired her longbow at the demon, rolling a natural "19" for the hit, and a d30 damage roll of "28" plus bonuses for the one-shot kill. The thing exploded in a fiery blast in midair, its disembodied, beaked head hurtling forward on its prior trajectory and clanging loudly against an iron barrier 120' further down the tunnel. The party dug its way past the rubble barrier and joined the kestrel in front of the huge iron door at the end of the passage.

Innominus cast detect magic, and was nearly blinded by the brightest arcane emanations he had ever seen when he looked at the formidable door. There were no apparent door handles, but the dwarves could tell that the huge door likely pushed inward, so they got together and with Yor's +1 crowbar pushed the heavy thing in. The sight that greeted them more or less temporarily blinded the still magic-detecting Innominus: an 8' diameter upright circular gate, just like the ones from the Stargate franchise, with nine different sections around the ring, five inscribed with one large symbol each, and four blank ones. A few feet in front of the upright gate was a small pedestal with a bowl fused to the top of it.

The five visible symbols included: a five-pointed star, a horned skull, a mountain, a circle, and a flame. The first four of these correlated to various types of Morag's keys the PCs had on them; presumably they had at last come upon one of Morag's Gates. Indeed, the bowl atop the small pedestal looked about the right size to receive one of the bone chits.

Hazel cast Read Languages upon the gate's symbols, to no avail.

Somehow the party decided to try the Gate out, choosing the "mountain" chit to insert into the pedestal-bowl. Dak tried to hold onto the chit without dropping in fully in, but once in the area of the bowl, the chit simply vaporized in his hand, and the gate activated. The whole circle rotated until the mountain symbol was at the top, then the gate within the circle winked to life.

Hazel sent the kestrel in, and through the kestrel's eyes she saw a vast, yet likely built or constructed, stone chamber, literally thousands of feet to a side. It was so vast and dark that it could not all be seen at once, the kestrel had to find a wall and fly the perimeter. Dak, Yor and Innominus prowled around in there for the better part of an hour, yet never reached a single wall. Dak etched his family rune into the stone floor before he left.

The party retreated back through Morag's Gate and waited on the Minochian side; it winked closed after two hours. The session ended.

Crazy Egor's - Closed Today

2011-09-11T15:47:00.000-04:00

Well, as expected, today I went to visit a promising looking FLGS, Crazy Egor's, in the nearby (20 minutes east) village of Hilton. It was an extremely pleasant drive down a country highway (Hwy. 18) to Hilton, and the road brought me into town right at the very corner at which Crazy Egor's sits:

Sadly for me, however, the shop was closed today for the first part of the afternoon, apparently due to a Trollish labor shortage:

So I had a late lunch at a nearby restaurant . . .

. . . noticed this cool clock . . .

. . . and headed west, back down the country road to my home village of Brockport.

Crazy Egor's: I'll be back.

The Take Home Message

2011-09-11T09:00:00.003-04:00

Spawn of Endra, September 23, 2006. Sharpie on Cotton Resume paper (8.5"x 11"). Spawn of Endra Gallery, State College PA.

Rochester Area FLGS Roundup

2011-09-10T18:00:00.002-04:00

Thanks to some great comments on my dice post, especially from Cid Phoenix, Jagatai and ze bulette, I now have a tentative roster of FLGS's in the Rochester, NY area, including:

Boldo's Armory, 891 Monroe Ave., Rochester
Phone: (585)271-3880
Hours: MWF 2PM-10PM, Tues. 9AM-10PM, Thurs. 11AM-10PM, Sat. Noon-10PM, Sun. Noon-7PM
Directions and notes from Cid: "Take 490 to Monroe/31 and take a right and it's pretty much right there on your right. It's a little hard to find and it's not quite a FLGS, but it's not too corporate either."

Millennium Games, 3047 West Henrietta Road (in the Henrietta Townline Plaza)
Or, according to Cid: "in Henrietta, on West Henrietta Road in a plaza just south of the railroad bridge."
Phone: (585)427-2190
Hours: Mon. - Thurs. 10:00AM - 10:00PM, Fri. 10:00AM - Midnight, Sat. 10:00AM - 10:00PM, Sun. 11:00AM - 10:00PM

Crazy Egor's, 4 South Ave., Hilton
Phone: (585)392-0230
Hours: Fri. 3:30pm to 7pm; Sat. 11am to 7pm; Sun. noon to 5pm; Mon. through Thurs. 3:30pm to 5:30pm, or by appointment.

Pair-A-Dice Games, 274 N. Goodman Street, Rochester
Hours: Mon. Closed, Tues. 2PM-8PM, Wed-Fri. 2PM-9PM, Sat. 11AM-8PM, Sun. Noon-6PM
From its website: "We are Rochester’s newest Gaming Store" [. . .] "We are able to do special orders and often are able to get the hard to get items from over seas. Our courteous and experienced owner is happy to assist with your gaming needs. We have free gaming tables that are available during store hours. We are happy to accommodate league play, and groups." Good signs, and while it looks like their in-house crowd may favor (or at least more heavily promote) Warhammer and Magic, there does appear to be a Retro Game Night scheduled there most Saturday evenings including one coming up on Oct. 1!

The best vibe of the lot is definitely Crazy Egor's, about which its own website says: "We sell everything new and currently available as well as everything that was ever published within the Adventure Gaming Industry. The store has thousands of items on hand and although we cannot stock 100% of everything new, we can get it." And: "There is open gaming space available and we are always ready to help you with what ever you may wish." Very good signs!

Crazy Egor's may have to be the first one I investigate . . . tomorrow . . .

But Pair-A-Dice, a lead I got from a local contact of mine, intrigues me as well . . . especially with that Retro Game Night they've got going!

[EDIT: There's a Retro Game Night coming up at Pair-A-Dice on September 17 as well, though I am already otherwise booked that afternoon and evening.]

Chessex Pound-O-Dice Arrives!

2011-09-10T08:05:00.000-04:00

As you may have guessed, I ordered a Pound-O-Dice from Chessex, and it arrived at my door yesterday! Here is the box it came in:

Here is the box, barely opened . . .

Viola!

A Pound-O-Dice!

(My cats prefer the box to the dice.)

Here's what a pound of dice looks like out of the bag . . .

. . . depicted here with the bonus set of dice it comes with in its separate sealed envelope . . .

. . . here is the bonus set itself . . .

. . . here are a few of my favorite individual dice from the Pound . . .

. . . and, lastly, the whole shebang.

Thanks Chessex!

Tales from OSRCon - Why I Love This Photo

2011-09-08T16:21:00.001-04:00

Ever since I returned from OSRCon in August, I have plugged a bunch of Garfield's photos into my computer desktop background as a rotating slide show. It is fun, as I work at my computer grading papers and the like, to see images go by that remind me of the AWESOME time I had at the Con.

One of my favorite photos in the bunch, at least of those that center on me as a subject, is this one:

I like this shot for several reasons:

- It was taken moments before OSRCon ended on Saturday, so it was literally the last shot taken of me while I was there.

- It depicts me wearing my LotFP shirt and holding a copy of Vornheim I just won -- so I'm sporting quite visible old-school credentials here.

- As I said, I won that copy of Vornheim in a post-session raffle, but it so happens that I already bought a copy of the book back in May. So rather than cling onto two copies, I asked around amongst some of my compatriots to see who wanted it or would get use out of it. It turns out that Theo (depicted below) was quite interested in Vornheim, so I simply gave him my newly won copy. Theo attempted to offer me money or trade for it, but I figured, hey, this was a total freebie for me, why not share the wealth with a gamer who will surely get use out of the product? So I insisted that he accept the spare copy of Vornheim as an OSRCon gift.

Theo

- Soon thereafter, as everyone was gathering up their stuff to leave the building for the last time that weekend, Theo came up to me and gave me a set of dice that he had used in my Friday morning Labyrinth Lord game. I had been admiring his dice earlier in the Con, and at the end, as a kind of karmic trade-off for giving him the Vornheim book, he gifted me that set of dice, which I subsequently photographed back at my hotel room:

The dice, alongside some Canadian coins.

And that is my favorite OSRCon story, a real illustration of the comradely spirit that characterized the whole event for me. Moral of the tale? Theo rocks, and so does OSRCon!

Lands of Ara = Rated R

2011-09-07T22:56:00.006-04:00

Well, I took this test and found out that we are rated R.

The reason: use of the words "death" (5x), "asshole" (3x), "pissed" (2x), and "drugs" (1x). [Note: I am personally a little surprised that Spawn and I haven't used the word "drugs" more than once on this blog. For shame!]

I suppose this means that everybody except the under-17's can pretty much keep reading The Lands of Ara blog without parental supervision. If you are younger than that, and reading this unsupervised, then don't tell your parents you're reading this fuckin' shit, okay?

To conclude, I am glad we at least hit the R, but I am secretly disappointed that we didn't rate an NC-17. Well done, James!

----
UPDATE: Fuck that shit! The previous post has fucking opium and Aleister Crowley in it! Satan Goat fuck, whore president, slut pederast, Bayern-Leverkusen. Licorice butt-fuck! 666.

Christ on crutches.

-SoE.

Aleister Crowley, Master of the Random Table: d12 Weird Encounters

2011-09-05T10:00:00.001-04:00

Thus spaketh thine beloved Spawn of Endra:

Every so often I pull some books off my shelf that relate to my early interest in the occult and the spiritual, and before I left Oregon I went back into a book I bought from a Mexican curanderia in downtown Fresno back in the summer of 1990, I believe. This is 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley, a collection of facsimiles of Crowley's essays Gematria, 777, and Sepher Sephiroth, published by Weiser with an editorial commentary by Israel Regardie. These were originally published in (what would amount to a zine of the time?) Equinox, and some of Crowley's jabs at his contemporaries would fit perfectly into an OSR blog. To wit, I think I've read this exact passage from the preface of 777 in someone's Penultimate post:

Every new sect aggravates the situation. Especially the Americans, grossly and crapulously ignorant as they are of the rudiments of any human language, seize like mongrel curs upon the putrid bones of their decaying monkey-jabber, and gnaw and tear them with fierce growls and howls. (777: p.x).

["them", refers to words themselves. It's kabbalah.] At any rate, I can pick up on that thread later, but to the matter at hand: 777 contains page after page of tables of correspondence that connect the 10 sephiroth of the kabbalistic Tree of Life and the 22 paths between them, which are mapped on the 10 numbers and the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet, to all manner of mundane and occult phenomena. Too much to explain here, but if you're having a vision while traversing from Tiphereth to Netzach, you check against this giant concordance to see if it smelled and looked right for that particular path, or if you were being deceived by some entity or whatnot. Crowley was an empiricist. Here's a couple of pages.

A few subtables struck me as being interesting random tables for D&D random road encounters, weird visions, or at least for inexplicable flavor. Here I've given the concordance for the 12 signs of the zodiac with the magical images of the angels of the decans ascendant, succedent and cadent as three d12 tables. The demons ruling these are another set of tables, but this will get you started.

Crowley may have needed opium to make these tables work. Column XXLIV indicates that for the old school gamer, opium corresponds to rolling a d12. Enjoy!

Mobile DM'ing Equipment - Dice

2011-09-05T07:54:00.001-04:00

With my public FLBS Labyrinth Lord game getting started soon, it strikes me that I may need to invest in a few more dice than I currently own. I recently revealed how many dice I possess, and it is not really a giant collection:

What I have now is enough for myself and a few players, but maybe not quite enough to go around if I get a large number of dice-less neophytes arriving at my gaming table later this month.

When it comes to new die purchasing, I immediately think of Chessex Dice. Look, for example, at these:

Or these:

Or perhaps it is finally GameScience time. I have read the posts about their quality and accuracy, and I am intrigued by some of the "oddball" selections like the d7 and the d5. Yet for my present purposes -- bulking out the collection for general, public use -- maybe Chessex is the way to go?

Any comments?

P.S. Note to self: I should also look up where the local game / hobby shop is in the Rochester, NY area, so maybe I can buy these dice from a FLGS.

FLBS Game - First Meeting Materials

2011-09-04T09:20:00.004-04:00

To prepare for my new public Labyrinth Lord gaming group's initial orientation meeting on Sunday September 18 at Lift Bridge Books, I have started gathering together some introductory materials to share with prospective participants who show up that day. The stuff I plan to bring along for show-and-tell and distribution to potential players includes:

- Examples of the game itself, including copies of the Moldvay-Cook B/X books (to show where we came from), plus two hardcover copies of Labyrinth Lord Revised, for show-and-tell only. Yes, I ordered a second hardcover copy of LL from lulu.com just for this group, that way I can keep one copy behind the screen and have another copy out on the table for player use. As I have stated before, hardback gaming books are the only way to go for me, partially for bibliophiliac reasons, yes, but mainly since they lie flat when opened on the game table.*

- A sign-up sheet asking for participant email addresses

- Handout: Meeting agenda including my contact information and links to Finch's Primer, the LL pdf download, and the Grognardia blog.

- Handout: hard copy of Matt Finch's Old-School Primer -- player section only (i.e., pp. 1-7).

- Handout: CDs with the LL no-art pdf and Finch's Primer pdf on it

That's it! I may also bring along some dice to that first meeting, we'll see. In any case, I should have enough stuff there to provide a basic intro to the game and to make neophytes as well as old hands feel welcome. At least I think so. Any thoughts or suggestions?

--
* Another solution to this dilemma was presented to me at OSRCon, when Marc brought a spiral-bound photocopy of the art-free downloadable pdf of the LL rules to my Friday morning game. I subsequently borrowed his spiral-bound copy for player use at my Saturday afternoon game. Thanks Marc!

Review: LotFP WFRP Referee

2011-09-02T17:07:00.007-04:00

This is Part 3 of a three-part review of James Raggi's Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-Playing Grindhouse Edition. Part 1 reviewed the game's Tutorial book; Part 2 the Rules and Magic volume. This third and final installment will discuss Referee. [Note: This review will NOT take in "A Stranger Storm," the adventure included on pp. 77-95 of Referee.]

First, the cover. While I stated in my review of Tutorial that I liked its cover the most of the three Grindhouse tomes, Peter Mullen's superb cover of Referee may give that one a run for its money. Mullen has a lively, vaguely Erol Otus-esque style that really jumps off the page, and his Referee cover captures quite an interesting moment indeed. Well done!

The Referee book itself opens with prose I tend to associate with Raggi's writings on the Lamentations of the Flame Princess blog. He even admits right at the outset of the Referee volume that "this book is much more loosely written than the other material in this game. This is me, the author, James Edwrad Raggi IV, talking to you, the reader." Hooray for that! In some ways, this is the kind of prose that I have been waiting for (but have seen less of) in the other volumes of the game. If I am going to invest in James Raggi's Grindhouse game, I surely expect to get a healthy dose of James Raggi's unique gaming worldview and balls-out expository style. While the Grindhouse rules themselves (and of course the notorious illos) are obviously an expression of Raggi's POV, the first two rule books are written in a very straightforward way, for clarity, and while that is a plus when it comes to understanding the rules, it is a minus for those of us who enjoy and take inspiration from Raggi's usual no-holds-barred writerly voice.*

This Referee book is chock-full of that engaging voice plus a wealth of insightful perspectives on what it means to be an effective old-school referee. In fact, should I wish to produce a non-system-specific "Primer on Old-School Refereeing," I could do a lot worse than to simply excerpt out pp. 2-6, 11-33, 45-46, and 62-68 from this volume. It's that good.

After a page of introductory remarks, the Referee tome launches right into the basics of Refereeing, covering a wide array of relevant topics of which I will simply gloss over some favorite highlights:

- "When the dice go badly for the players, they should be thinking about how to not let a roll of the die be the sole determiner of their fates. And when the dice go a little too well for the players, the Referee should note what he needs to do to prevent a single die roll from determining the course of an entire adventure" (p.18). Raggi is nothing if not fair-minded, strongly advocating the roll of the dice over Referee fiat. No fudging the dice!

- "In-character favors and personal connections are a type of reward that isn't commonly used in this sort of game, but in a continuing campaign this could be extremely valuable" (p. 19). I use these kinds of "rewards" all the time, and appreciate Raggi mentioning them here.

- The whole section on "Variety" (pp. 19-20) is just golden, containing advice like: "Change elements of your adventures, and change them often. [. . .] Keeping a campaign fresh through constant variety is the key to maintaining interest, for the players and for yourself." Indeed! This is an important idea yet is not always given this much emphasis in other RPG'ing rulebooks I've seen.

- Here is Raggi's manifesto on "Railroading" (p. 20), reprinted verbatim:

Repeat after me:

"My adventures and campaigns will have no pre-set endings. Characters are not required to act as I wish them to act during the course of the game. It is natural player behavior to trash scenarios and take the game to places unforeseen."

He even prints this a second time, exhorting the reader to recite it aloud. Raggi means business here, and this is absolutely the right thing to emphasize. I only wish I had read (and recited aloud) these words back in 1992 or so; it would have saved me a few disastrous sessions during that heady period.

- In his section on "Using Published Adventures" (pp. 31-32), which I appreciated a lot, Raggi makes the following important observation: "Some referees are great creative thinkers and make excellent adventures, but not every Referee can manage these things. Running a great game requires different skills that creating a great adventure. Never feel like you're doing something wrong just because you didn't write everything that you use in your campaign."

- Then there's the "Don't Change Anything Else" section (p. 32), in which Raggi again reiterates his view on the value of using other people's modules: "The very advantage of using adventures written by others is defeated if you change every detail to more closely match your style. After you take away the elements that could harm your campaign and change the names and other such details to fit your campaign, leave the adventures alone. Run them in the spirit they were written." I struggle with this, liking to tinker with other folks' modules, but I absolutely agree with Raggi here in principle.

Next Referee tackles issues relating to "The Campaign," including:

- "As characters travel, more areas that began as mere concepts can be filled in and become true locations. Your world will grow organically" (p. 33). Hear, hear! This is exactly how world-creation should occur, IMO. For example, I didn't know jack shit about the Minochian town of Fortinbras prior to my current party's setting up home base there; we have co-created it through play. This is the essence of sandbox play and a superb strategy for older-school, lower-prep GM's.

- I am quite fond of the section on "NPCs" (pp. 45-46), and would particularly like to single out this sharp little tidbit for honorable mention: "Quick rule of thumb: Average NPCs that don't need a name unless a player asks just have average stats. The important NPCs get +3 in modifiers to spread around. [. . .] Next -step-down NPCs get +2 in modifiers, and more common 'lieutenant' personalities just get a +1."

- On page 46 I noted an in-text reference to the back cover NPC charts, which are GREAT:

A sample of LotFP Referee's awesome back-cover NPC table.

- A listing (with brief commentary) of some of the key OSR publishers (pp. 74-76), including Basic Fantasy RPG, Black Blade, Brave Halfling, Frog God, Goblinoid, OSRIC, and a few others. This is a smart thing to include, a nice resource for somebody (especially a Referee) just entering the OSR end of the hobby.

- BEST TABLE EVER (p. 76), which gives AC equivalents for LotFP, Labyrinth Lord, S&W (ascending and descending), OSRIC, and Basic Fantasy RPG. Well done!

In sum, this is the best of the three LotFP WFRP books, IMO. It is certainly the most "Raggian" of the three volumes, and I think that it poignantly reminds us that Raggi is particularly insightful when it comes to effective techniques to use behind the screen.** Not to diminish the Grindhouse game itself, but Referee is where its author really shines and I could easily see this book being sold as a stand-alone volume, perhaps in a slightly abridged version re-titled James Raggi's Essential Referee's Handbook. I doubt Mr. Raggi has any interest in such a project, though, so for now I must simply recommend that you BUY GRINDHOUSE in order to acquire this book -- and the elegant, extremely well-produced game system to which it belongs.

--
*Raggi even says of himself on p. 2 of Referee that "I am a far better writer than I am a Referee, for sure" -- an interesting comment, to which I return when I talk about my experience of Raggi-as-Referee in the other footnote to this review.
** I can vouch for this firsthand, having played in one of the online playtest groups for "A Stranger Storm," the adventure included in Referee. Raggi is an absolute delight as a DM, and is especially good at acting out the roles of the NPCs.

Mobile DM'ing Equipment - Minis vs. Card Tokens

2011-09-01T16:45:00.002-04:00

I got some great comments on my recent post about possibly investing in minis for Con / public game play. One of the ideas that got suggested was that rather than going for 3D minis at all, I could simply use card tokens (like that pictured above) on my new battle mat instead.

There do seem to be a number of advantages in going this route:

- card tokens are surely cheaper than 3D minis, yes?

- card tokens travel easily and take up far less space than minis

- Kelvin has some here for free download

- At least in theory, one could prevail upon (or literally hire out) artists from the OSR blogosphere (Hi Kelvin!) to create custom tokens for specific monsters and PC types (e.g., rodians) one needs

Is this line of thinking blasphemy, as Christian suggests?

As a counterpoint, here is EGG on the subject of minis:

USE OF MINIATURE FIGURES WITH THE GAME

The special figures cast for ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS add color to play and make refereeing far easier. Each player might be required to furnish painted figures representing his or her player character and all henchmen and/or hirelings included in the game session. Such distinctively painted figures enable you to immediately recognize each individual involved. Figures can be placed so as to show their order of march, i.e., which characters are in the lead, which are in the middle, and which are bringing up the rear. Furthermore, players are more readily able to visualize their array and plan actions while seeing the reason for your restrictions on their actions. Monster figures are likewise most helpful, as many things become instantly apparent when a party is arrayed and their monster opponent(s) placed. Furnishing such monsters is probably best undertaken as a joint effort, the whole group contributing towards the purchase of such figurines on a regular basis. Be very careful to purchase castings which are in scale! Out of scale monsters are virtually worthless in many cases. As a rule of thumb, HO scale is 25 mm = 1 actual inch = 6’ in scale height or length or breadth.

Figure bases are necessarily broad in order to assure that the figures will stand in the proper position and not constantly be falling over. Because of this, it is usually necessary to use a ground scale twice that of the actual scale for HO, and squares of about 1 actual inch per side are suggested. Each ground scale inch can then be used to equal 3% linear feet, so a 10’ wide scale corridor is 3 actual inches in width and shown as 3 separate squares. This allows depiction of the typical array of three figures abreast, and also enables easy handling of such figures when they are moved. While you may not find it convenient to actually use such figures and floor plans to handle routine dungeon movement, having sheets of squares for encounter area depiction will probably be quite helpful. If you do so, be certain to remember that ground scale differs from figure scale, and when dealing with length, two man-sized figures per square is quite possible, as the space is actually 6 scale feet with respect to length. This is meaningful when attacking a snake, dragon, etc. if characters are able to attack the creature’s body length. With respect to basically bipedal, erect opponents, scale will not be a factor.

Details of preparation and painting of miniature figures for the game are not germane to this work. Your hobby supplier will have an assortment of small brushes and paints for such purposes, and you may inquire there as to the best techniques of painting.

Dungeon Master's Guide pp. 10-11

Any thoughts anyone?

Session 41: Saving Lives, Exposing Demons

2011-08-30T19:57:00.001-04:00

Vivuli: "Fuck everyone else!"

Innominus: "That's our motto."

This session took place on Thursday, August 18 and included PCs Innominus (Clr 6), Hazel (Ftr 4 / MU 4), Yor (Dwf 5), and Vivuli (Assassin 5 / MU 2).

We picked up right where the previous session left off, in the King Hargon Inn, the dwarven dining and drinking establishment in Fortinbras, on the morning of Day 149 of the party's Arandish adventures.*

Last session, the party decided that their over-arching plan would be to venture back to Farn Junction and attempt to purchase the "haunted" (and currently shut down) Frigglestone Brothers' mine. However, since Farn Junction lies a couple days' travel north of Fortinbras, the party started out this session talking over their immediate next move, and decided to head out east of town to Prince Arkus' country manor house (formerly the late Baron Kaminster's country manor house).

No sooner had they decided upon a course of action and headed eastward out of town than it began to snow rather heavily.** By the time they reached the stone-walled country manor of Prince Arkus, acting Baron of Rogaland, visibility was limited by snowfall and the PCs drove their wagon up to the Manor Gate through four inches of fairly dense snow. Just before the group reached the area of the Manor proper, Hazel turned herself invisible, a state in which she would stay for the remainder of the session.

Baronet LeForge, a local aristocrat and soldier, met the party at the Manor's heavy iron gate and asked their purpose for being there. Yor stated that he was there to see the Prince on behalf of the most prominent local Dwarven families (e.g., the Grimmbricks, the Frigglestones, and his own), to which the Baronet replied that Prince Arkus was ill and could not receive visitors. Innominus then stepped forward and offered his services as a Divine healer, here to help the Prince. After sending a runner into the house to make an inquiry, Baronet LeForge ordered the Gate be opened and waved the group into the circular inner courtyard.

Arkus' servants took their wagon and horses around to the stables, and the party was shown into the Manor. Entering the front hall, Hazel immediately noticed, at the top of a stairwell to the second floor, a robed man she felt sure matched the description of the wizard who had followed her on the town streets the night before. Vivuli also scanned the whole area with his X-ray vision ring as he passed through the foyer; he spotted a secret door hidden in the wall to the left of the stairwell. That secret door led to yet another stairwell leading down, underground, underneath the Manor.

While the rest of the party were shown into a parlor [marked with "X" on Map 1], Hazel, still invisible, sneaked up the stairs and followed the familiar-seeming robed man left down a hallway. Beastarr, Innominus' bobcat familiar, lingered back and distracted the foyer guards so they would not hear Hazel's invisible passing and ascent.

MAP 1: A hastily composed map of Prince Arkus' country manor's foyer. X marks the parlor where most of the PCs waited for Grand Vizier Krock, and circled x's indicate posted guards.

The robed fellow entered a door on the left side of the hallway and sat down at a table therein, picking up a book. Hazel cast ESP in anticipation of invading his thoughts. Once she arrived at the door, cracked it open, and scanned his mind, she found that he was thinking about what he was reading: a turgid romance adventure novel about an aristocrat who goes around in a mask, fighting sea pirates and sea monsters and having steamy sexual encounters with all manner of ladies he encounters. Nonplussed, Hazel retreated back down the hall, looking across the second-floor landing to the other side: an ornate archway leading to the plushly carpeted Regal Apartments, flanked by two heavily armed Royal Guards. Hazel sneaked back down the stairs.

Meanwhile, the rest of the party was joined in the downstairs parlor by Grand Vizier Krock, Prince Arkus' closest adviser and also, incidentally, one of the world's most enthusiastic Uncle Junkal fans (see Session 35). And while the much-beloved rodian bard was not actually present this session, Krock nevertheless recalled Innominus, Yor & Co. from their prior heroics in Farn Junction. So he was just thrilled to see the PCs, and asked how he could be of service.

Yor and Innominus convinced Krock that they should be allowed to see the sick Prince and try to help him, even if (as Krock tried to explain) Father Azamondius of the Kaladarian Temple of the Brothers of Carcoon was on his way to Fortinbras for the same purpose, expected to arrive that very afternoon. Innominus, insisting that there was no time to waste, persuaded Krock to let he and Yor upstairs into the Royal Chambers. They went, accompanied by the Vizier.

Vivuli, meanwhile, asked one of the guardsmen where the crapper was, and was told it lay just off the kitchen and banquet hall, just across the foyer [see room marked "WC" on Map 1]. Vivuli went into the "chamber pot closet" and then cast Conjure Familiar, attracting a small monkey (an Emperor Tamarin to be exact) named "Fu Man" to be his new animalistic compadre. Accompanied by Fu Man, Vivuli sneaked silently out of the toilet, approached the area of the secret door under the stairs, and investigated, inspecting the latch mechanism etc. It appeared free from traps, just hidden.

Upstairs, Innominus cast detect magic in the chamber where Prince Arkus lay bedridden. A plain-looking ring on Arkus' bedside table glowed, as did all the weapons and armor used by the four Royal Guards posted in the room.

Next the cleric of Endra cast detect evil, and the only thing in the whole room that glowed were the small black pockmarks all over the Prince's neck and face -- they radiated very strong evil indeed.

Downstairs, an invisible Hazel joined Vivuli at the secret door, and, after the assassin / magic-user popped the door open, stumbling clumsily against the wall to make it appear accidental, the fighter / magic-user and the monkey slipped through the secret door and onto the unlit stairwell below. Hazel closed the door behind them and they quietly descended as Vivuli continued his stumble, concealing their passage from the guards.

At the bottom of the flight of stairs was a three-way intersection, with passages headed left (south), straight ahead (west), and right (north).

MAP 2: The underground passages beneath the Manor, also hastily drawn.

Hazel stood still at the intersection a moment and listened. From the south passage came the faint sound of someone playing a clarinet, practicing the same five-note progression over and over. From the west, a faint but steady dripping noise. And most ominously, from the north, the dull, irregular sound of someone being choked or strangled.

UPSTAIRS, while Innominus of Endra prepared to work his healing magic on the inert Prince, Yor pulled Grand Vizier Krock aside and raised a delicate but pertinent matter: "The Prince is a very sick man. Who would succeed him as Lord of Minoch should he not survive?" The Vizier replied: "Since Prince Arkus has no blood successors, the Right of Succession passes to the highest ranking nobleman in the land, which at present would be Count Dooku."

Innominus, not having direct access to the cure disease spell, prayed a divine prayer to Endra, his diety, beseeching the demigod for the power to heal Prince Arkus. Due to the power and conviction of his prayer, his wish was granted, and Innominus cast cure disease upon the fallen prince.

The black spots on Arkus' face and neck began to congeal together under his skin, oozing up toward his mouth, then spraying out of his mouth like animated black vomit. The black vomit-thing protruding from the prince's gob took on, for a split-second, the visage of a horrible, fiery demon, then vanished completely. The bedridden prince regained some color to his previously ashen cheeks, and everyone in the room breathed a sigh of relief. Innominus had saved Prince Arkus' life. The Vizier rejoiced and offered the 10,000gp Honorarium originally intended for Father Azamondius of Carcoon to Innominus and the Temple of Endra instead.

Meanwhile, UNDERGROUND, Hazel approached a door down the north passageway, from whence the strangling sound came. By the time she silently opened the door to peek in, the sound seemed to have changed to a horrible chewing or crunching. Indeed, inside a dark chamber beyond were two gargoyle-like demons, winged and black with four arms each and faintly glowing red eyes. They were hunched over the carcass of a Royal Guardsman, eating lustily. One of the demons glanced up when Hazel cracked the door open, but she was invisible and the gargoyle-demon seemed not to care.

Hazel closed the door, retreated to the intersection, and pointed her wand of trap detection down the north hall. There was indeed a trapped door down there, which Hazel declined to investigate further. She instead went upstairs to report her findings to her compatriots.

Innominus warned Grand Vizier Krock that he had a serious problem on his hands here, and advised him to allow the party to explore the whole house and "purge it of demons." The Vizier consented, and the group descended into the underground level and returned to the door behind which Hazel had seen the black gargoyle-demons.

Innominus kicked the door open, holding up his amulet of continual light. Vivuli held a vial of Holy Water on high, while Yor readied his deadly New Steel dwarven axe. Hazel kept an eye on their flank, flame tongue at the ready.

Combat ensued immediately, with the demons viciously clawing at Yor and Innominus as Viv chucked flasks, Innominus cast prayer, and Yor hacked and slashed at the demons to his heart's content. After a few rounds of bloody battle, one demon was dead and the second was attempting to escape the chamber via a gate it had summoned. Acting swiftly, Innominus cast dispel magic upon the demon's gate; the gate collapsed, spitting the demon back out onto the floor. Then Yor hacked it to death.

The Vizier, who had pissed and shat himself in terror upon the appearance of the demons, climbed out of the pool of excrement in which he had been cowering and thanked the party profusely.

There, more or less, the session ended.

"I have no problem chucking a guard up front to take the first blow."

--Yor

DM's Notes
Fun session! And our first with four separate online (Skype) video chat participants (that's me at the bottom of the screen).

Viv Summons his Familiar in the Crapper
What an inventive piece of business. I had to let him do this, so here is the "back story" of Fu Man the Emperor Tamarin: He was traveling with a troupe of vaudevillians, whom he did not particularly like, and the group passed through Fortinbras on its way to Farn Junction. Fu Man escaped the caravan and then got caught out in the snow, and headed in the Manor window for warmth. There he met Viv in the crapper and became his new familiar.

Fu Man, Vivuli's monkey familiar.

Random Manor Generation
The reason the above maps are so hastily drawn is because no specific maps of the Manor interior existed until the PCs showed up there this session. Of course, I knew a few facts about its general layout, and obviously I knew the broad strokes of what was going on there, but I mapped it on the fly and even used the Dungeon Alphabet p. 32 "Random Original Purpose of Rooms" to determine what was where once Hazel started prowling around upstairs. Along this line, I also generated a couple of the sounds Hazel heard in the downstairs corridor intersection using the "Random Sounds" table on p. 148 of the AEC.

--
* With one (rather gratuitous) continuity error: as we started this session, the players and I both forgot that they were holding a wizard captive in a rented room at the King Hargon Inn. We have since ruled that the PCs simply left their gagged captive at the King Hargon, under the supervision of some reliable dwarves.
** I have decided to deploy a d12-based "snow check" for every day of the Arandish / Minochian winter. High numbers (10, 11, 12) indicate heavy snow, midrange numbers (5-9) mean light snow, and low numbers (1-4) mean no precipitation. This session I rolled a "12."

Review: Digital Orc's Dad's Pepper Dish Recipe

2011-08-29T10:00:00.003-04:00

From the kitchen of thoust Spawn of Endra:

I'm not much of an innovator in the Old School blogosphere, but I think I may have finally come up with something original*. I'm not a DM and I've never felt qualified to give a review of anything Old School, until now. I AM a proven Old School cook, so here's a review of a recent recipe for Gaming Grub posted by Mr. Digital Orc a few weeks back -- his Dad's Pepper Dish. I've recently moved to central Pennsylvania and Saturday evening I was bored and hungry, waiting for the Irenic apocalypse:

The hellish view from my back porch Saturday evening (slightly altered)

While looking for a recipe for ajvar I saw that I had bookmarked DO's recipe. I have been greatly impressed by the pickled banana peppers I get on subs around here, and so I'm on board to start working with these vegetables. And maybe Irene was coming inland and this would have be my last home-cooked meal for a while. Who knows?

The recipe is simple: 1/2lb bacon; 3lb red potatoes; 15-20 banana peppers; S&P to taste. That's it. Cook in phases in a covered skillet. Well, I looked at my skillet and could not see all this fitting in there, nor did I have a lid for it. So I went to the next biggest heavy implement: my Dutch Oven. Seriously. It took me a few hours to realize how weirdly appropriate this was. I started in simmering the bacon and then adding in the red potato wedges:

I strirred/tossed this every 5min or so to spread the browning love. While this was going on, I was dealing with the peppers. I used Hungarian wax peppers ... presumably the same thing? But DO's instructions were confusing:

Remove caps and seeds of banana peppers, cut into 2 inch rings, add to skillet, allow to cook for 15-25 minutes until banana peppers cook down.

Being the type that will always play the system as written before house-ruling it, I cut the peppers into 2"-long, er ... tubes? In the end, I don't think this matters, but removing the seeds and membranes (my habit, not strictly in the recipe) from these is a real pain in the ass. But eventually I prevailed:

Very pretty. I let it cook away for about 15 minutes and then by that point there was a fair amount of browned bacon/potato residue on the bottom, so I pulled it off the stovetop and finished it in the oven at 350F for ~10 min to avoid a charred blackened mess. By the time I got to the peppers, all the stirring/tossing had pretty much gotten it to a chunky mash consistency. In the end, after adding some black pepper and 1-2 tsp of salt, I had a right mash if there ever was one:

I'll admit, as this thing moved along I had some doubts. The recipe looked like it had some serious gaps, and the fact that it was turning into a hash/mash ... well, maybe that's right but who knows? DO doesn't say how it should look. Then I'm thinking, "If this sucks, what kind of an asshole am I to write a negative review of somebody's sketch of a favorite recipe on a blog about gaming? That's the worst possible Old School blogosphere asshole imaginable!" Indeed, such a creature will appear on the cover of Raggi's new Random Blogospheric Asshole Generator, due out this Fall from Goodman Games.

But all of this worry was for naught. I have no idea if this is the correct outcome (i.e., the hash format), but this dish was DELICIOUS. The bacon of course is going to be nice, but because of the potatoes it doesn't make the dish overly salty (you still need to add salt at the end). The bacon fat makes the potatoes creamy but not heavy, and the juices from the peppers permeate the dish and add a really nice noticeable but mild, clean heat to the dish. The tanginess of the peppers adds a distinct flavor and if you've got good bacon these two things provide all the seasoning you need outside of S&P.

Okay, it's good, but how good? Well, at the end of the night here's what the dutch oven looked like:

That's right. I ate the whole damn thing all by myself over the course of 4-5 hours, right off the stove top. 3lbs of potatoes, 1/2 lb bacon and 15-20 peppers, down my gullet. Could not stop and didn't want to. Such a simple and sublime dish. Having this on your stove top is a sign of good living. I think if you were to cook this for game night, probably double the recipe.

In Conclusion: Digital Orc's Dad got this dish right and is presumably a genius. It embodies everything I love about rustic one-pot cooking. 4.5** of 5 stars

_____________________________________________

* I've been looking at some older posts from Grognardia, The RPG Corner, Jeff's Gameblogs and DNDWPS lately and it's shocking to see how many ideas I think are new have been circulated in the OSR back in fucking 2006 or 2008. Prog rock RPG setting? Yes, it's been done.

** I need to leave open the possibility of something even more awesome than this dish; otherwise, 5 of 5.

Mobile DM'ing Equipment - Combat Mat

2011-08-28T15:41:00.000-04:00

Now that I have DM'ed my first Con game, I find myself thinking about my equipment needs a bit differently. For example, in the olden days (the 1990s), I used to use a huge, classroom-sized white board for drawing maps and diagramming complex tactical encounters for my home RPG'ing group. Now that I DM exclusively from Skype, I don't do that anymore -- my big whiteboard is down in the garage.

For OSRCon, I acquired a mini-whiteboard, and it worked really well during Con play for quickly drawing a room layout or diagramming a combat scenario.

But then I got back from Toronto and saw the above picture of James Maliszeski's Crystal Caste "combat mat" and then read this comment where he tells exactly where to buy it [and more recently, some other folks have jumped on the trend]. I got really inspired by this, for I realized that a flexible mat like that would be great for on-the-road DM'ing, and it even has gridlines and hexes on alternate sides to boot. So now, thirty bucks (with shipping) later, I have a flexible combat mat on its way to my house.

Oddly, at the time I ordered the mat, the revelation I share in the next paragraph literally did not occur to me at all. It was not until after I ordered the mat and reflected upon my consumerist victory that this related idea emerged and I realized (too late!) that I may have inadvertently taken a step toward creating a huge monster.

For the purchase of this combat mat inevitably leads me to the topic of miniatures, an aspect of our beloved hobby with which I have never directly engaged. Yes, you read that right, I have never owned nor painted a single miniature. I have gamed a small handful of times using them, but only when someone else brought them along. I don't dislike using them if they're on hand; I have just never felt the need to actively seek them out. I have an ambivalent relationship with fantasy miniatures.

But now I have that damn battle mat coming, and there's also this recent news about a line of miniatures being released specifically to complement Labyrinth Lord. I have to admit, that second set of soon-to-be-released minis shown here, the "Level Two Monsters" box, looks kind of badassed:

Includes 3 Gnolls, 3 Ghouls, 3 Zombies, 4 Troglodytes, 2 Shadows, 3 Large Crab Spiders, 3 Berserkers, 1 Green Slime, 1 Yellow Mold and an Evil Magic-User.

So should I invest in a few minis (for practical purposes if nothing else) since I have already thrown down for the combat mat? Or is this how a horrible obsession starts? It just seems like having a few minis to accompany the mat would make a smart combination of practical materials for quickly sorting out combat situations at Cons and the like, when (real-world) time is a factor.

I think the biggest down side to my collecting any minis at all is that I have no interest in painting them. Sitting around painting minis does not (at this juncture) strike me as much of a good time. But then again, once you buy them, have you not taken that critical first step toward the dark side?