Black Star and the Light of Xaryxis

As a break from our Land of Azurth 5e game, I decided a wanted to run a loose, more space opera adaptation of the Spelljammer adventure Light of Xaryxis. After considering the Star Raiders action flick of Outgunned and some other fairly light space opera games, I settled on Black Star from LakeSide Games. Mainly, I felt like trying something new, but it's even lighter than Outgunned, I think, and made for Space Opera.

The system uses a simple 2d6 roll to resolve tasks, though characters can spend Resolve (which also serves as Stress/Hit Points) to either reroll or move a failure to a partial success or a success to a greater success. It also has only player rolls and minion rules, both things I've enjoyed in Broken Compass/Outgunned.

It's only about $5 on drivethru, so worth checking out if that sort of system sounds interesting to you.

Anyway, we only did characters this session, but I'm looking forward to bringing a touch of Star Wars ripoff space opera in the vein of Battle Beyond the Stars and Micronauts to Light of Xaryxis.

Some Observations on Science Fiction Names

I think there is a lineage of science fiction name coining that whose progenitor is Edgar Rice Burroughs' Mars stories but that passes through early to mid-20th Century pulpier sci-fi like the works of Edmond Hamilton and Jack Vance to the galaxy far, far away of the Star Wars Universe.

In his Mars stories Burroughs went for relatively short (mostly 1-2 syllable), two part, phonetically simple names. Though they don't mostly sound that way to modern ears, I suspect Burroughs was after what he thought of as an "Oriental" feel. They also wind up being very simple for English speaking readers to pronounce. Examples: Kantos Kan, Gan Had, Ras Thuvas, Sab Than, Sojat Yam.

Burroughs uses a not hugely different style in many of his Planetary Romances.

Edmond Hamilton was clearly influenced by Burroughs in a number of ways and the naming practices in several of his works are similar, though they are a bit more phoentically diverse and have more consonant blends. Here are some names from his Captain Future series:  Sus Urgal, Re Elam, Thuro Thuun, Rok Olor, Si Twih, Brai Balt

Typically, he doesn't always try to be so "exotic." Sometimes he seems to be trying to convey future developments of English names. This tact he shares with other writers of the 1940s-1960s, including the various creators of the members of the Legion of Super-Heroes in DC Comics: Irma Ardeen, Rok Krinn, Garth Ranzz, Tinya Wazzo.

Jack Vance tends to take this latter approach in some of his science fiction, too, though his names are more often multisyllabic and have a first-name last name pattern with each name sometimes made up of more than one element. Still, they have a similar vibe I think to the Hamilton and Legion names. These are from the first two Demon Princes novels:  Miro Hetzel, Conwit Clent, Lens Larque, Sion Trumble, Kokor Hekkus, Kirth Gersen.

Star Wars names aren't the product of one individual, though later writers have obviously tried to fit the standards of the original trilogy. There are more straight up English names in Star Wars and of course some pseudo-Japanese ones, but a number could easily have been characters in Captain Future stories, like these: Ric Ole, Sio Bibble, Pondo Baba, Plo Kloon, Nien Nunb, Mace Windu, Sy Snootles.

Occurrences in the Night in and Around Phaelorn Gap

 

Art by Marvano

Our Gnydrion game using Grok?! continued last night. The party on hand:

• Antor Hogus (Paul) - Vagabond with a stun gun and now a chatty quaklu
• Nortin Tauss (Aaron) - An arcane dabbler, skeptical of Hogus' decisions
• Yzma Vekna (Andrea) - A grubby teamster trying to be the voice of reason
• Jerfus Grek (Jason) - A vagabond, but fat where Hogus is lean, and possessed of a kaleidoscopic cloak

The quaklu, ungagged last session, related to Antor Hogus that it had seen a murder. Kreik Gelmot had dropped a body wrapped in a cloth into a pit outside of town, then he tried to dispose of quaklu who had witness the deed.

Jerfus Grek, resposing on the scrub nearby around a meager campfire of dried caloot dung,  overheard this entire story and strode up to see if there was some way he might profit. Around this time, the others arrived. Jerfus shared some honeyed, beetle-spiced dusted pastries to win them all over.

The group had the quaklu lead them (after it was placated with a pastry) across the plain to the whole where the body was dropped. It appeared to be an abandoned mineshaft or well. The ascertained their was indeed a body in the hole, but it was dead! Bafflingly, the individual in the pit named himself as Kreik Gelmot!

The group thought of various ways to allow him to climb out, but they were stymied by Gelmot's reported injuries. Using Jerfus' undergarment wrap and Yzma's collapsible pole, Yzma manages to get itno the whole and get Gelmot out.

He seems injured pretty bad, but while they are discussing what to do, he stands up and straightens his own broken limbs then walks off toward town. The party finds this highly unusual and suspects the first Gelmot is the genuine one (if there is a genuine one) and this one is some sort of doppelganger. Antor tries to stun him, but he shrugs it off and keeps going.

Yzma rushes ahead to town to warn the law, The Shreev is in bed but she finds his deputy, Varr Nee. He's skeptical of their claims of the Gelmot Double being unusual, so they get no help.

Yzma and Jerfus shadow Gelmot Double to the hotel, The Golden Idle. He enters a room where they find the other Gelmot. He tells them quite a tale: He took on a job from a mysterious individual he took to be a high official to deliver a tube-shaped container (unopened) to a Wol Zumderbast  at the Inn at Thono. Gelmot's curiosity got the better of him and he broke the wax seal of the tube and found a strange, flexible mirror inside. When he unrolled it to examine it, his reflection started to move out of sync with him, then stepped from the mirror!  He subdued the double and tried to dispose of it to hide his actions, but the talkative quaklu gave it all away. 

While he's telling his story, Jerfus slips the tube from Gelmot's bag, and when he gets a chanc,e hides it outside the hotel. The others arrive, and Gelmot begs them all to dispose of the doppelganger. They refuse and instead stun him and tie him up. Then, they summon the deputy, who demands an explanation for the strange scene.

The Battle with the Loom

I'm a session behind with my reports on our 5e Land of Azurth campaign. We played last Sunday and on October 29th, and the second was a continuation of the first, the events separated only by a short rest. The party was seeking the artificial being, Loom, responsible for this place, the even madder copy of the failing mind of Mad Mirabilis Lum. They had managed to defeat every challenge Loom had thrown at him, but they still hadn't found the Warrior Princess of Sang they were trying to rescue.

They took on two robots with flamethrowers, then an enraged Ettin. After that, they progressed down into the excavation. Clearly Loom was having his forces dig out some ancient structure which none of them recognized. Looking for some evidence of what it might be, they came into a cave. They didn't have much time to look around, because there was a battle cry and the mind-controlled Princess Bellona came running at them with sword and pistol. They get lucky, evading her blows and their numbers allow them party to finally subdue her. They notice a shimmering cloud that leaves her and flies away into the dark extent of the cave.

The party followed it and came to the end of the excavation. There was the shimmering image of Loom. he sent forth more of those clouds to attack them (nanite swarms, though they didn't know what they were). Still, they persevered and the substance of Loom was so degraded, what was left of him had to flee. That worried them, but it was a problem for another day.

The returned with Bellona to the workshop of the Clockwork Princess who told them about a metal giant she planned to resurrect to attack the Wizard in the Sapphire City!

Wednesday Comics: DC, February 1983 (week 3)

My mission: read DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! This week, I'm looking at the comics at newsstands around November 18, 1983.

Warlord #66: I reviewed the story in this issue here. No "The Barren Earth" backup this time around.

Brave & the Bold #195: Barr and Aparo team Batman up with Andrew "I...Vampire!" Bennett, which brings that strip definitively into the DC Universe (and that in turn necessitates the events of House of Mystery this week). Anyway, Batman is on the trail of killers who attacked the daughter of a crime-lord named Hodges, leaving bite marks in her neck, and Bennett is in Gotham after the Blood Red Moon. The two team-up and discover the responsible part is another crime lord who is the new lover of Mary. Bennett takes a bullet meant for Batman, which turns out to be a silver. Batman saves Bennett's life with a blood transfusion. Realizing that his daughter is the only thing important to him, Hodges decides to retire from his life of crime. The two heroes part ways, both feeling like they've made a new ally and friend.

Camelot 3000 #3: Another solid installment in the futuristic Arthurian epic from Barr, Bolland, and Patterson, though we're still in the "getting the band together" phase. Merlin tells Arthur that there is an enemy arraying forces against them. We learn that Morgan Le Fay is organizing the aliens that are attacking Earth. Merlin sends Arthur and his allies to find his remaining knights: Percival (a newly made Neo-Man), Galahad (a futuristic samurai), Tristan (a woman at her wedding) and Kay (a criminal). At United Earth Defense headquarters, the alien ships have been traced to their point of origin: the tenth planet!

Daring New Adventures of Supergirl #3: Kupperberg and Infantino/Oksner pit Supergirl against the Gang, a group of four super-powered costumed mercenaries, who are stealing a satellite from the Aerospace Technologies Show. Ms. Mesmer, one of the Gang members, hypnotizes Supergirl into immobility long enough for them to make a getaway. She also plants a post-hypnotic suggestion in Supergirl's mind that will trigger something she fears when she sees her reflection, if she and the Gang meet again. Supergirl's house-neighbor John Ostrander is unwittingly to be the messenger to deliver payment for the robbery to the Gang, who has given the satellite to Lester Adams, but Ostrander has bails on the messenger gig to audition for a play. When the Gang confront Ostrander, Supergirl is on hand to battle them. Then she sees her reflection in a window, but it's the face of Linda Danvers. Thinking she may have revealed her secret identity, she flies away.

There's a Lois Lane backup by O'Flynn and Oksner that continues the story from last issue. Two crooks paralyze Missy's mother from the waist down with a gunshot, but she is reunited with her husband and the crooks responsible for the kidnapping are captured. Then, Lois and Perry White discover that, somehow, Jimmy Olsen is responsible for the prophetic news stories.

Green Lantern #161: Barr and Pollard/La Rosa are aiding and abetting Wolfman's efforts to make the Omega Men happen. They come in like the cavalry to rescue Jordan and Dorine from execution by the Headmen. They head out to free the people of Garon. The Guardians step in to make sure the Citadel doesn't help the Headmen. The battle on Garon is still tough and our heroes are unable to prevail outright, but they do manage to evacuate the remaining anti-Headmen dissidents in the face of a Psion invasion.

In the Tales of the Green Lantern Corps backup by Snyder and Gibbons, Harvid, a retired Green Lantern is tending his garden as a storm approaches, when he gets a surprise visit from his brother. A brother he sent to 100 years of solitary confinement during his time of service. The two old men begin to fight while around them the storm gathers strength. When the storm causes the dam to break, neither man has the strength to fix it alone, forcing them to work together. In the end, the exhausted brothers make peace and head to Harvid's house for some wine.

House of Mystery #313: Mishkin and Gonzales/Sutton pick up where last issue left off with "I...Vampire!" Bennett and the reporter are captured by scientist Allen Barr who reveals that his famous cancer cure is made by injecting homeless people with a spider-derived serum and turning them into arachnohumanoids. Also, the cancer cure never worked and was just a means to killing off vampires by making the blood supply poisonous. Why? Well, Barr is revealed is a vampire himself and he's tries to eliminate the competition. But that's not the last twist! After rescuing Bennett the reporter reveals herself to be a vampire as well. She tosses Bennett a copy of the antidote, then returns to her masters in the Blood Red Moon. Bennett flies away from the burning laboratory, wondering why an agent of the Blood Red Moon would help him. Surely this wasn't what was intended when this cancer cure storyline was introduced, but comics have to turn ever back to the status quo.

After that there's a short by Skeates and Rodriquez about a guy on a fad diet whose idle fancies have been changing his wife. First making her more attractive, and dutiful and finally accidentally changing her into a fried chicken. In the last story by Kashdan and Infantino a greedy Uncle Ben kills his young, scientifically inclined nephew so he can inherit his fortune, but the bacterium cultivated by the boy (which looks sort of like a Viking Proty) avenges him. 

Legion of Super-Heroes #296: This was another issue I had as a kid, though I didn't remember the story at all. While the Legionnaires are involved in some missions or personal time, a terrorist (a fireballer) strikes at the home of Cosmic Boy's parents. Also, Light Lass leaves the team.

Night Force #7: With the "demon" (whatever that means) unleashed by or from Vanessa's psyche rampages through the complex, Caine and Gold try frantically to escape. Both are made to face how they exploited Vanessa in different ways and are punished for it. Caine loses an arm and a leg and is forced to recognize it was his actions that led to his wife's death.  Gold admits (to himself) that he misled Vanessa about his feelings--but to save their lives he has to do it again. Vanessa's rage subsides.

Meanwhile, Baron Winters rescues the cops stuck in the past, and they are so confused and scared they leave without arresting him.

Sgt. Rock #373: This is a goof one from Kanigher and Kubert. Rock and Easy are in North Africa. Rock has to cross the desert solo to get to some town for some reason and the merciless sun beating down on his helmet makes him start hallucinating (I guess) that his helmet is on fire. Except the native peoples he's there to help see it too and take him for some sort of mythological character or demigod and give him a sword and a shield. He runs at the Germans with these and defeats them. Maybe this isn't the worst Sgt. Rock story since I've been doing this, but it's the worst I can remember in a while.

Weird Revisited: Alternate Worldcrawl

The original version of this post appeared in 2015...

One of the complaints against the standard D&D Planes is that, while conceptually interesting perhaps, its hard to know what to do with them as adventuring sites. One solution would be to borrow a page from science fiction and comic books and replace them with a mutliverse of alternate worlds. These would be easy to use for adventuring purposes and could put an additional genre spin on the proceedings. Here are a few examples:

Anti-World: An alignment reversed version of the campaign setting. Perhaps humanoids are in ascendance and human and demihumans are marauding killers living underground.

Dark Sun World: In this world, the setting underwent a magical cataclysm in the past and is now a desert  beneath a dying sun.

Lycanthropia: The world is cloaked in eternal night and lycanthrope has spread to most of the population.

Modern World: This version has a technology level equal to our own (or at least the 1970s) and the PCs have counterparts who play adventurers in some sort of game.

Spelljammer World: A crashed spacecraft led to a magictech revolution and space colonization.

Western World: Try a little sixguns and sorcery and replace standard setting trappings with something more like the Old West.

Wednesday Comics: DC, February 1983 (week 2)

I'm reading DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! Today, I'm looking at the comics at newsstands on the week of November 11, 1982. 

Batman #356:  After all the Catwoman business, Bruce and Vicki are still an item, but Vicki's work increasingly means Bruce only gets a limited amount of her time. After a date cut short, Bruce returns home and gets attacked by Alfred. Except it isn't the real Alfred, and Bruce wonders if somehow he imagined the whole thing. Meanwhile, Vicki gets done with her work and calls Wayne Manor only to find that Bruce hasn't returned home. It's all part of the overly elaborate revenge plot of Hugo Strange.

While the real Dick Grayson goes looking for Bruce, Bruce is attacked by a fake Grayson in the phony Wayne Manor. Injury to that Dick Grayson reveals it to be a robot. Bruce goes into the Batcave and he finds a cleanshaven Strange dressed as Batman. Strange reveals how he faked his death, then he gives Bruce a spare Batsuit so that they can settle the score once and for all. The two Bat-men duke it out, but Strange's ruthlessness momentarily gives him the upper hand. Robin appears in the Batcave and is confused at the sight of two Batmen. When Strange Bats commands him to kill the "fake" Batman, Robin realizes who's the real deal and turns against Strange. Not wanting to be taken in, Strange apparently blows himself up and the fake Wayne Manor.

Dick and Bruce return to their real home just in time to save Alfred from a final Bruce Wayne robot. I guess Conway didn't like the way Strange died the first time? It seems a lot of effort just to quickly kill him again. Of course, he'll be back, but not in a Conway story. 

Flash #318: Creed Phillips is starting to unravel it seems. He kills his Butler who discovers the Eradicator costume he left carelessly laying around, then he goes on live TV and outs himself as the deadly vigilante during a TV interview. It turns out the Eradicator and Creed personalities are somewhat separate, and the Eradicator one chooses to kidnap Fiona Webb as they flee the station. This is all sort of (perhaps unintentionally funny) because elsewhere in the issue Flash and the lunatic, wannabe hero Captain Invincible have been trying to figure out who Eradicator is--then the guy just reveals himself on TV. 

While Philips/Eradicator and Webb are in a cave outside the city, Flash and Invincible are searching Phillips' apartment, which has been rigged with a bomb booby trap. When the bomb is triggered, The Flash vibrates his molecules to become intangible, but the blast wave knocks him out, and he gets partially fused with the wall. Captain Invincible tries to help, but overestimates the necessary force in breaking the way, sending them both plummeting to the street, far down below.

We get a Creeper backup from Gafford and Gibbons. The Creeper prevents a mugging in Gotham City, as enforcer "Thumbs" Tamblin tries to collect an overdue payment from discredited doctor Ben Goldstein. Jack Ryder has a new job, so he leaves Gotham and catches a bus to Boston. His new boss, H.J. Harrigan, suggests he start with an investigation into Tamblin, who has also moved to Boston after getting involved with his former boss's daughter. Tamblin's new boss, Wesley Winterborne, sends him to collect some debts, but the Creeper interrupts. Tamblin's goon shoots the Creeper, who falls out of the window into the Charles River.

G.I. Combat #250: In the first Haunted Tank story, the crew has been told one member of their crew is going to be representing the armor division in a nationwide bond drive tour. Each member of the team believes they're the best and deserve to be chosen, but a day of the typical sort of fighting the tank gets into, they return to base and tell their commander he'll need to pick someone else, because everyone in their team is more important than in other. They act as one.

In the second Tank story, the crew picks up a Major Kendall, who had just escaped from the Germans with important information. Ultimately, The group has to split up, with Rick and Kendall running off to lure the Germans away. They walk into a trap at an abandoned mill, however, and the rest of the crew must come to the rescue.

There's an O.S.S. story by Kanigher and Cruz where an operative named Eagle is taken to a German POW campe where he hopes to ferret out a mole. It turns out to be a man the other prisoners believed was simple-minded and harmless. Then Kashdan and Ayers present the story of an experiment Sergeant in Vietnam who finally snaps under pressure, but in doing so he still inadvertently saves his unit. The last story relates to ANZAC coast-watchers and intelligence provided before the Battle of Midway.

Masters of the Universe #2: I bought this issue off the stands as a kid, I reviewed it here.

 

Saga of the Swamp Thing #10: Kay, now revealed as Helmut Kriptmann tries to force Swamp Thing and his allies to help in his quest to destroy Karen Clancy. When his psychic, Grossman, fails to hold him Kriptman, has to switch tactics and persuade them. Ultimately, they agree.

Meanwhile, Grasp and Sunderland discover that Liz Tremayne is still alive, and Kay is working on his own project. Grasp is ordered to hunt them down.

Feldner as able to fill Swamp and crew in on Karen's plans thanks to the period she had him captured. She needs the pendulum of Nazi occultist von Ruhnstedt who eventually died at Dachau. The group rushes there to find a hellish scene. Karen has raised an army of dead German soldiers while she flies overhead searching for Von Ruhnstedt. The undead occultist tells her that the pendulum is in the hands of a person with a collection of Nazi memorabilia in Berchtesgaden. Karen then destroys the entire camp in "an avalanche of psionic fury" and disappears.

When they've escaped the rubble, Kriptmann begs the others for assistance in stopping Karen. Barclay says that he wants nothing more to do with the sort of monster responsible for places like this. Kriptmann reveals that he wasn't a Nazi by showing the prisoner's tattoo on his arm.

In the Cavalieri/Carrillo Phantom Stranger backup, The Phantom Stranger and his ally are sentenced by living gargoyles to be killed by being crushed by the great clapper of the church's bell, but in a Raiders of the Lost Ark-ish turn, the two have to shut their eyes and not move as the power of God (I guess) punishes the gargoyles for their sacrilege.

New Teen Titans #28: Changeling continues his pursuit of the fugitive Terra. He finally captures her and brings her to Titans Tower, convinced the team can help her. Meanwhile, Brother Blood's cult strongholds are being systematically attacked and destroyed by the Brotherhood of Evil. 

While all this is going on, the other Titans pursue their private lives: Dick gets being kind of an ass to Kory; Donna meets Terry Long's ex-wife and young daughter for the first time, and it's a tense meeting; and Raven meditates. Kid Flash, Raven, and Cyborg are on hand when Changeling brings Terra in. After hearing how she had been forced to commit crimes by terrorists holding her parents, the rulers of the nation of Markovia, the Titans rush off to attack and subdue her tormentors but discover that the girl's parents have long since been killed. Changeling befriends Terra in her grief, but Raven keeps getting bad vibes about her.

Superman #380: Bates and Swan reveal the perils of time travel. Superman returning from a mission to the past and Superboy going home after a visit to the Legion of Super-Heroes. They both come across a strange gap in spacetime, and both make the unwise decision to fly straight through. They bump into each other and their consciousnesses get mixed up. While they are doing the usual heroics and trying to sort things out, but there's a man named Euphor who has to ability to absorb people's unhappiness. He's got ulterior motives, though, and plans use all of Metropolis' unhappiness to gain power.