Why do You Think I Have This Outrageous Accent?

A question for you GMs out there: How much do you “play” NPCs in your game?

I (mostly) tend to play NPCs as characters. They get their own manner of speech and verbal idiosyncrasies. A pirate captain might get a vaguely piratical patter, a wealthy, double-dealing merchant might sound like Sydney Greenstreet in The Maltese Falcon, or a supercilious shopowner a bit like Jonathan Harris' Dr. Smith in Lost in Space (I should add all these voices most only be considered approximate). I tend to keep the use of accents to a minimum, as I’m not particularly good at them, but sometimes I hint at them with stereotypical vocabulary.

Now that’s what I try to do. Sometimes I lose track of who I gave what voice to. Other times it just gets tedious dropping in and out of character, so I mostly abandon it once the player’s have “got it.”

I’ve played in games where GMs did similarly, but also games where the GMs went light on differentiating NPCs, often just telling the players what they said in the third person. I have no idea which approach is must common, though.

(The title of this post also represents my first Monty Python reference in a year and a half of rpg-blogging. I feel like I’ve crossed some sort of Rubicon.)

Pictures from Ealderde

Though the Great War diminshed its importance to the City and the New World, the Old World continues:

Despite the ever-present poison, mutagenic fog and periodic morlock assaults, the surviving people of Lugdun seldom fail to take part in traditional Godsday worship services.

Soldiers in the Imperial Staarkish Army on the day the Great War began with one of their walkers.

Hellhounds--summoned and bound by military sorcerers during the war--now stalk the wastes in Eastern Ealderde.

Hard times have led people to turn to perverse old religions out of desperation. Here, witchcraft is lampooned in a racy stage show in Metropolis, but the fear of these cults is very real.

Since Korambeck had to relinquish its hold over the Middle East, the Jinn (beings of smokeless fire) have reasserted their rule over much of the region. There are rumors they’re even rebuilding their fabled capital lost Irem of the Pillars.

Mail Order Monster

Some unlucky sap in the City will find out this ad is genuine--at least once. The seeds for seven plant monsters will arrive, but there is only a 30% chance of 1-3 more than one of them actually being viable. One is quite enough, as it grows into a ravenous monster with a taste for flesh. Small quantities of blood will satiate it for the first 1d8 days, then it require small animals or the equivalent for 2d12 more. Finally, only human flesh will truly satiate it: one full body every 3-4 days. The creature communicates its needs nonvocally--perhaps telepathically--with its owner. Only the need is clear, not how this is known. It will not let the owner rest unless it's fed. The incessant need has been known to drive men to madness.

After 5-6 weeks the monster has reached full size and goes on a rampage. The oh-so helpful owner is often the first victim.

[I'd treat the grown creature(s) as a tendriculos from the SRD, or from the Swords & Wizardry Monster Compendium.]

Not Heroes

The grizzled veteran looked up from the finger he had been diligently sawing at with his knife.

“Huh?”

“I says,” his small friend repeats, not taking his eyes from the bugbear’s finger—and more importantly the ring on it—”it must be magical, else why’s it so damn hard to remove?”

“Not you.  Him.” The veterans gestures to me with the knife, and the smaller man finally notices.

“Oh! You’re the scribe, ain’t ya?”

I nod.

“Thought Goan was minding you.”

“He was. He died yesterday.” I think back to the unfortunate, nervous Goan. He had eyes that had darted around like spooked birds. They weren't vigilant enough, apparently, to avoid the dripping slime that burned a hole straight through him. It had taken him longer to die than I would have thought, but die he did despite the cleric’s efforts.

“Ah,” the veteran says with a tone that refuses to commit to either sympathy or disinterest. The smaller man just nods, and seems a bit embarassed.

“I’m looking for the captain.”

The veteran points with a thumb, slick and glistening with what must be bugbear ichor. “Down that passage. He’s at the door with the mage.”

I head down the rough-hewn passage, stepping around more bugbear carcasses, leaving the adventurers to their work.

The two did eventually succeed in getting the ring. The small man (his name was Orven) was right: it was magical. It allowed the wearer to breath underwater--which saved Orven from a judicial drowning in Nharm, but helped him not at all when months later someone drowned him in a cask of cheap wine and cut the ring from his hand.

Warlord Wednesday: Back-Up from Atlantis

Here's another look at one of Warlord's backup features--the one running in the issues I've been reviewing in recent weeks:

ARION, LORD OF ATLANTIS

First Appearance: Warlord #55 (1982)
Featured as Back-up: Warlord #55-62
Next Seen: Arion, Lord of Atlantis #1 (November 1982)
His Story: Arion is the Grand Mage to the King of Atlantis and Atlantis' defender against the encroaching ice age and the forces of Chaos--including his brother, Garn Daanuth. Arion was the creation of writer Paul Kupperberg and artist Jan Duursema.  It's a more "high fantasy" series than the most of comic's fantasy offerings that tend to be in a Sword & Sorcery mode.  The series lasted 35 issues and Arion made contemporaneous appearances in Crisis on Infinite Earths.  After 1985, Arion didn't appear again until 1991's Books of Magic vol. 1 #1, which was followed by a six issue limited series Arion the Immortal.
How He's Like the Warlord: He's got ties to Atlantis and a swordswoman consort.  He's also resembles Jennifer Morgan, the Warlord's daughter, with his magical prowess and flowing locks.

Double Your Fun

One of the great things about superhero role-playing games is that you can do things that would never be done in comics. If you want Spider-man to grow old and retire, you can do it. If you want Batman to take on a young blind kid named Matt Murdock as the new Robin, you can do it. Any number of cross company (or even cross-media) crossovers you can do it.

Unfortunately, other than a few cross-company crossovers, there aren’t too many comic images to inspire the imagination in that regard. Or at least there weren't.

The blog Marvel Two-in-One...The Lost Issues! (previously Brave and the Bold...The Lost Issues!) features covers than never were for those two famous team-up titles. Here’s some examples:

So head over and check 'em out!

Troll Hunter

I saw the Norwegian film Troll Hunter (Trolljegeren) this weekend--which was timely given all the recent blogosphere discussion related to 0-level characters and the heroicness (or nonheroicness) of adventurers. The film is a mokumentary supposedly made by a group of students setting out to do an exposé on a bear poacher, but instead recording their adventures with a lone troll hunter sanctioned by a secret Norwegian government agency.

Along the way we learn a bit about the naturalism of trolls. There are multiple varieties with different habits, but they all have a weakness to sunlight (exploited through the use of UV radiation) and they can smell Christians (though not Muslims, apparently). We also see the lengths the government goes to hide the knowledge of trolls' existence from the general populace, which provides much of the film’s humor.

Hans, the troll hunter, is wearily professional and matter-of-fact about his job--and occasionally regretful of his past actions. The students are sometimes fascinated (perhaps even exhilirated) by the hidden world they’re discovering--and sometimes scared out of their minds. Everybody does a good bit or running and more than a little hiding. It strikes me as a nice approach for the portrayal of adventurers in any era.

The film is obviously low budget, but the digital effects are surprisingly effective. It shows what SyFy originals could do if they had more effort put into their scripts. There’s a lot of riding around in the Norwegian countryside--it isn’t th fastest moving film--but I think that just lends it more verisimilitude.

If you get a chance, check it out (I saw it on HDNet movies and it's coming to blu-ray next week). It’s an inventive premise, and a nice mixture of humor and thriller.

Images from the Strange New World

The Academy Obscura convenes only rarely but always to punish those who have made the unknown known. What mysteries they hold sacred, what secrets inviolate, who can say? It’s rumored their punishment involves forever removing the certainty of the transgressor's existence, leaving them forever trapped between life and death, being and nonbeing.

You can even get the drop on a shadow assassin--if you’re packing the right ammunition.  Bullets made from paraffin mixed with used candle wax (with right incantation applied when it was burning) do the job.

Such is the power of the brain invader that Colonel Gordon’s men didn’t notice his body was being ridden by one of the creatures until it was far too late.  The corpses of his men were found in a mass grave; there was, of course, nothing left of the Colonel's skull.

"Charley Rictus is a trusted lieutenant and enforcer for the Malbolge family. He's been killed and raised at least nine times on record: multiple shootings, stabbings, a couple of poisonings, an emasculation, and one total dismemberment. Now it looks like he wants to cut a deal. Maybe he wants to retire on a beach somewhere and rot in peace, or maybe he thinks he can break his Faustian pact and save his soul from eternal damnation. I don't know and I don't care. I just need him at the courthouse--with the important parts intact."

Dragged from the River

A lot of unusual things get pulled out of the Eldritch and Wyrd Rivers that run through the City and flank Empire Island. Here are a few examples (1d12):

1. A crate packed with soggy straw and 1-4 large blue-gray eggs.
2. A chained box containing a frog. The frog will dance belt out vaudeville songs--but only when just one person is present.
3. A doll crudely made but nevertheless bearing an uncanny resemblance to one of the PCs.
4. A mummified creature:

5. A metal hand that, when placed on a hard surface and unrestricted, will scuttle and orient itself to point west.
6. A metal box resembling a hat box, difficult to open due to a magic lock. In darkness, a glow emanates from its seams. Particularly sensitive individuals my hear soft moans periodically from sinide.
7. An undead mermaid bearing a zombie contagion.
8. A shabby coat--which is utterly dry, and in fact, can never be made wet.
9. A case of bootleg whiskey an imbiber will be able to perceive the astral plane for 1-2 hours, and then be sick for 2-8 more on a failed save.
10. A figurine of snake-like creature with human arms. Anyone who touches it will have a nightmare about a basalt ziggurat beneath a blood-red sun in some distant jungle.
11. A book of matches from "The Ostensible Cat" night-club.
12. A wax phonograph cylinder containing a third of a potent magical incantation.

Two Tough Characters from the City

In gearing up for my game in the City, I thought I’d stat up a few characters for my player’s to have as examples. Here, (in my modified version of Stuart Robertson’s Weird West) are a couple of Tough Guys (the City’s version of Fighters):

“Salty” Sam Depape
Old sailor as at home in a South Seas squall as he is in a Wharf Street ginhouse brawl.

Path: Tough Guy
Level: 5

Fighting 5 “I always out-roughs ‘em”
Toughness (Grit) 5 “one tough gazookus”
Special (Magic) 1 “I gots a secret weppin”
Knack (Skill) 2 “old sea-hand”

Weapons:
Fists d2

Special Abilities:
koboloba leaf: Fighting +2, Toughness +1 after consumption. Unarmed attacks use d6. Lasts until end of fight.  Once a day.

Eliza Gunn
Tough young gal from the Dustlands.

Path: Tough Guy
Level: 4

Fighting 4 “good in a scrap”
Toughness 4 “girl’s tougher than she looks”
Special 0
Knack 3 “ace mechanic”

Weapons:
magic over-sized wrench: d6 damage. Can harm magical creatures that couldn’t otherwise be harmed. Unbreakable.

Warlord Wednesday: Royal Flush

Let's re-enter the lost world with another installment of my issue by issue examination of DC Comic's Warlord, the earlier installments of which can be found here...

"Royal Flush"

Warlord (vol. 1) #58 (June 1982)

Written by Mike Grell (Sharon Grell); Penciled by Mark Texiera; Inked by Pablo Marcos

Synopsis: The Morgan impostor has taken to drinking from the stress of his intrigues. When Tara comes looking for him he lashes out and backhands her. Mistake--as Tara quickly has a sword to his throat.

She's more upset that enraged, though. She bars “Morgan” from her bed and runs out with tears in her eyes--right into Graemore. He sees she’s upset and asks her to go for a ride with him.

Out in the countryside, Graemore can’t help but ask about the man he can’t believe won Tara’s heart. Tara says that Morgan’s changed: he sides with the conservatives in the council, he never speaks his native tongue anymore, and he doesn’t wear his gun. He isn’t the man she fell in love with anymore.

That gives Graemore hope. He thinks back to when he first met Tara. He and his parents were brought before her father, the King of Shamballah, in shackles as spoils of war. The king found out that Graemore’s mother was a smith responsible for making many of the arms used against Shamballah. Rather than hold a grudge, he giave her a job and Graemore’s father as well, who was to teach the princess to read. They were quartered in the castle, and it was in the castle garden’ that Graemore first met Tara when they were children.

Over time, their friendship blossomed into young love. This doesn’t go unnoticed by the king who sends Graemore and his family away to remove any impediments to Tara doing her duty and entering a political marriage to another royal.

Graemore’s mind in the past gets his head whacked by a tree branch in the present. He falls from his horse. When Tara, taunting, comes to help him up he pulls her down, too. The two share a moment, and Graemore goes in for the kiss. Tara allows it briefly, then pulls away. Graemore feels rejected and goes to get the horses. Tara follows after him and...

Back in Shamballah, Darvin leaves Griff to watch the prisoner’s cell. Griff wastes no time in delegating the duty to Tinder so he can go outside. Tinder bemoans his bad luck--unknowingly sitting outside his father’s cell.

Meanwhile, Darvin waits outside the palace walls and accousts Praedor when he sees him leaving. Once he figured out who the prisoner was, it wasn’t hard for him to figure out where to find the conspirators. Now, he wants more gold because of the danger of what he’s doing. While they negotiate, Darvin sees the impostor walking by and he knows the whole game. He wants his gold doubled.

Praedor tells him to wait there and he’ll get it. Darvin stands there, twirling his cane, pretty pleased with himself. He happens to be there when Tara and Graemore come riding back in. In a flash, he remembers where he saw Tinder’s weird armlet (actually a wristwatch) before--it had been around the arm of Queen Tara when he had performed for her back when he was court magician.

Praedor returns with the gold and a threat lest Darvin come back to the palace, but Darvin isn’t even listening. A bigger score occupies his mind. He’s got the prince of Shamballah in his gang!
 
Things to Notice:

• Again, the imposter does a poor job of impersonating Morgan.
• Despite living in a world where magic makes impersonation really easy, no one has yet considered that this person behaving very much out of character might not be Morgan.
• Maybe I'm imagining it, but I believe Texeira's pose for the Shamballan king on the throne is similar to some Kirby renderings of Odin.

Where It Comes From:
The title of this issue references a "royal flush," the highest ranking standard poker hand (an ace-high straight flush).

Elsewhere in the Bronze Age... My friend, Jim, has returned to the blogosphere after an extended time away in his Arctic Fortress of Solitude (which he sublets to Doc Savage) over at the Flashback Universe Blog.  Check it out.  There, you can find some of my pre-FtSS  comics related articles in the "Bronze Age Spotlight"--including my as yet uncompleted Bronze Age Alphabet.

Cults & Muscle Cars: Drive Angry

Drive Angry didn’t perform well at the box office, which is a shame. It’s an over-the-top homage to grindhouse (probably the most grindhouse film (not titled "Grindhouse") since The Devil’s Rejects. What Drive Angry’s got that none of the those other recent films have (well, except maybe Planet Terror) is eminent gameableness.

Drive Angry starts in media res with Milton (Nicholas Cage)-- escapee from Hell with a muscle car--getting the best of some thugs and getting information from them before doing them in. Milton is a man with a mission: A Satanic cult leader has kidnapped his granddaughter (after killing his daughter) and plans to sacrifice her on the night of the full moon. Milton's got three nights to track them down to save his grandchild and exact his revenge.

Complicating matters is that Milton himself is being pursued. The smartly dressed and unflappable Accountant (William Fichtner) is after him, sent by Lucifer to bring him back to Hell. The Accountant is unkillable (mostly) and able to convince others (mainly the law) by supernatural means to help him in hunting Milton down.

Milton’s companion through all this mayhem is a former waitress (Amber Heard) whose car he borrows. The two must fight the Accountant, cultists, and law enforcement to reach Milton’s goal. Milton’s also unkillable (he’s already dead) but his best weapon is likewise fugitive from hell: the God Killer--a mystic firearm with three Latin engraved bullets--that could kill the Accoutant if it hit him.

Drive Angry plays like a synthesis of several seventies b-movie types: the car chase film (Vanishing Point, Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry), the revenge film (Rolling Thunder), and the "fight with a Satanic cult" film (Race with the Devil)--plus a comic book supernatural element. Is there a generic grindhouse rpg? No matter; I could see this sort of thing in a modern occult game (like Unknown Armies), but you could probably do it in a post-apocalyptic game easily enough, or even borrow elements (the Accountant, the God Killer) for non-modern settings.

The Fat and Lonely Frog

That fat frog isn’t a statue! It’s no idol of a god but the god itself--or at least the part of it that can fit into four dimensions. It’s a god, and it’s terribly lonely and lovelorn.

That flower and basket are gifts to woo the object of its desire. It appears in a person’s dreams and offers those gifts naively, sweetly. Once it’s made contact with a person, however, its gifts become more personally meaningful--and seductive.

The frog must be resisted at all costs. Notice it’s obscenely over-full belly. The objects of the frogs devotion wind up there, slowly being dissolved and subsumed into the frog’s alien substance over eternity.

LONELY FROG GOD
When encountered has a 60% chance of developing an interesting in the person present with the highest Charisma (in event of tie, the first one it saw gets preference). The frog enters the unshielded mind of the object of its ardor in dreams. The victim will imagine the frog has promised them of great value--riches, station, his or her hearts desire.  The Frog will charm person (as a 12th level caster) to make the victim succumb and return to where its statue is so he may swallow them up. Saving throw gets a +1 for every 10 miles distance the victim is from the statue at the time of the frog’s overture. A victim swallowed by the frog is alive for a period of time, but held inside the frog’s extradimensional substance and unable to escape with the use of magic (teleportation or the like) even if they wanted to do so. 
Inspired by Tim's worries about his and the Whisk's batrachian garden statue, and JB's challenge to write something related to it. 

X-Men: First Class

I saw X-Men: First Class this weekend, and I think it may be the best of the x-films (it’s been awhile since I’ve seen the first and second though, so I can’t say for certain). It’s certainly the best since the second. Still, my primary reaction to the film is to wish it had done a bit more

(Which I suppose was similar to reaction to Thor, admittedly, though for different reasons. Neither rank as my favorite film of this spring--which was Hanna, for the record).

So for those unaware, First Class is a prequel to the earlier X-Men movies, mainly telling of the story of the rise and fall of the friendship betwixt Charles “Professor X” Xavier and Erik “Magneto” Lensherr. Much of the film is character set-up: Xavier living it up in college and being super-enthused about mutation, and Lensherr playing super-powered badass Nazi hunter as he goes after the sadistic doctor who first noticed his mutant power.

The main action of the film takes place in the sixties--specifically around the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Xavier and Lensherr must train a team of young mutants to take on Sebastian Shaw and his gang who’ve got a wonderfully mad science plan to touch off a nuclear war, spreading radiation to create more mutants, so then Shaw can rule in a post-apocalyptic mutant world.

Strangely for a film with a group of young mutants, it doesn’t attempt to tap any of the Twilight teen energy--which would have seemed a good way to go in a marketing sense (if not any other!). Instead it focuses on Xavier and Lensherr, yet all the doings don’t give us as much on the philosophical/personality differences (other than a facile "don't kill!" from Xavier) as I would have liked. Also, it largely kind of short-hands the development of their friendship. One can only do so much in one film with a lot of characters to introduce and a lot of set-up to do, but it would have been nice if the script had focused more on some drama stuff rather than exotic locales that don’t really feel particularly exotic.

And maybe its because I’ve recently been burning through 4 seasons of Madmen, but the sixties of the film doesn’t evoke the era much beyond the hippie Halloween costume sort of way. The Hellfire Club is cast as a swank Playboy Club-type night-spot, but what music do they have playing? “Palisades Park.” Now, why not something more apropos to the setting and the age of the people in attendance--and cooler--like maybe “Mister Kiss Kiss Bang Bang?”

Those complaints aside, the film did make me think about how the superhero genre could be combined with other genres in the rpg context. World War II is an easy one, but this film suggests how supers could be done with a splash of swinging spy-fi--or swinging spy-fi with a supers chaser like Nick Fury: Agent of SHIELD. A grittier supers game could probably be done around super-powered Nazi hunters. Kim Newman’s alternate history short-story “Ubermensch!” might be instructive here , as well.

More Weird Adventures Art

With the last of the Weird Adventures art rolling in over the next few weeks (hopefully), I thought I'd tease with a few more great illustrations:

This is a day (uh--night) in the life of a Barrow-Man--just doing his job defending the serenity of the City's dead buried on its island Potter's field.  This piece was masterfully rendered (with a sort of EC Comics flourish I really dig) by Stefan Poag (Limpey to the fans of his blog).

Here's a portrait of a cabal of insidious Reds--those diminutive, subterranean would-be world conquers.  This one was done by Alex Garcia in what strikes me as sort of a Marvel Bronze Age style.  Cool, huh?

Last but not least, Felt delves into alternate universe archeology and comes up with this fragment of Ancient pottery, probably brought out of tomb-mound by some adventurer.

Still looking forward to more to come from these guys and other artists from the blogosphere like Johnathan Bingham.

Death & Taxes

After surviving the deadly hazards of the underground, loot laden adventurers in the City must face another foe as cunning as he is rapacious: The taxman.

Long ago, the town father’s of the City decided that treasure uncovered in the areas of its hegemony rightfully belonged to the people. This particularly applied to ancient artifacts like coins or objects of art. The brave (or foolhardy) souls who hauled it to the surface deserved something for their efforts--which they reckoned at best at 70%. This is, of course, reduced by various other fees resulting from destruction of public property, hazardous carcass removal, etc. Adventurers are allowed to deduct equipment and provisioning costs, but only if the appropriate forms are submitted in the appropriate manner.

Adventurer’s might consider melting down precious metal artifacts to render them unrecognizable--but the ownership of gold by private individuals (except in jewelry or coins of numismatical interest) is illegal--not that adventurers are opposed to illegal means, but why keep the evidence around? An adventurer’s only option is fencing of his loot and laundering the proceeds. Of course, this too puts an adventurer in danger as it may draw him into the web of the Hell Syndicate.

Discretion is always important. The bland, gray-suited men of the Municipal Department of Taxation and Finance are not without their own resources. Higher level agents carry wooden coins which writhe in their pockets in the vicinity of gold. Some are able to detect lies as well.

The Municipal Building, where their offices are housed, is a veritable temple to the eikone Management. The place is so aligned with Law that all nonlawful beings suffer confusion and demoralization (-2 to all Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma checks) inside its walls, if seeking to act against its bureaucracy.

Those who damage (or attempt to damage) the Municipal Building or harm its agents, while flaunting its rules run the risk of calling down an inevitable upon them. These powerful constructs punish transgressions against bureaucracy and law. They're believed to be summoned by a teletype machine in a sub-basement office beneath the building. Some rumors suggest the summoning of an inevitable requires a civil servant to burn his employment record in a waste bin, surrendering his identity--and his pension.

Warlord Wednesday: Double Entendre

Let's re-enter the lost world with another installment of my issue by issue examination of DC Comic's Warlord, the earlier installments of which can be found here...

"Double Entendre"

Warlord (vol. 1) #57 (May 1982)

Written by Mike Grell (Sharon Grell); Penciled by Mark Texiera; Inked by Pablo Marcos

Synopsis: Travis Morgan struggles back to consciousness and find himself chained in a dungeon--and locked in a metal mask. Slowly, his memories of recent events--his double, the ambush--form in his mind.  He yells with rage as he realizes his wife is “in the hands--and arms--of a man she believes to be him.”

Darvin (he of the impressive moustache) is not fazed by the outburst. He shuts the door to Morgan’s cell and tells Griff, his lackey, to summon the troops. Soon he’s meeting with his gang of urchins. He tells them the dungeon is off limits, and if they should have to go near it, they should be quiet; he doesn’t wish their guest to know where he is. One of the kids asks who their guest is. Darvin thinks a moment, and replies that it’s a...

After the other kids leave, Darvin asks where Tinder is. When Griff replies that he’s probably out practicing his craft on his own, Darvin gets angry. He’s afraid Tinder will get caught and give them all away to the authorities. He orders Griff to go out and find him.

Meanwhile in the palace, Graemore (he also of the impressive moustache) and Tara are getting reacquainted--and Graemore is falling in love once more. Tara is distracted from Graemore’s mooning over her by Morgan walking by. Morgan ignores her--because he isn't Morgan, of course.

The Morgan impostor, but isn’t, strides into the office of Praedor, his co-conspirator. The impostor even fools him at first. Their plan is to have the impostor (in the guise of her husband) steer Tara the way they want. Then Shamballah can return to being the sort of dictatorship they want it to be. Praedor reminds the impostor to wear the sword and gunbelt as Morgan always does. The man says he’ll remember and takes his leave.

Elsewhere, Griff is “looking for Tinder” by leaning against a wall and eating an apple. By chance, he does catch sight of the boy botching a bit of cutpursery. Griff helps Tinder get the best of the irate, sword-wielding mark, and the two boys escape.

The two goof around for a bit. They climb the palace walls to peak over onto its grounds. Then Griff says he’s got to get back to guard a prisoner. That sounds fun to Tinder.

Back at the palace, the impostor is getting to know Morgan’s gun:

He finally winds up shooting it off (though not in his own face). Tara runs to see what’s going on. She finds the impostor examining the hole he made in the wall, somewhat shaken. He tells her he was fooling around and it went off.

Tara doesn’t believe him, but she changes the subject. She tells him that Graemore is between jobs, and she offered to let him stay for a while. She expects Morgan to get angry, but he’s not bothered at all. Surprised at his reaction, she throws her arms around him and they kiss.

Meanwhile, the real Travis Morgan remains locked away in Darvin’s dungeon.

Things to Notice:

• There's a double, but no real double entendre this issue.
• The impostor doesn't seem to have really studied Morgan very much to pull this impresonation off.

Where It Comes From:
Morgan gets an iron mask this issue, making the inspiration from Dumas even more explicit.

A "double entendre" is, of course, is a phrase intended to have a two meanings--one of which is usually sexual or risque.

The Sounds of Gaming

I’ve seen other bloggers mention music at their gaming sessions. Sometimes it just seemed to be something that was playing in the background, other times people choose it as a sort of game soundtrack. I don’t know how widespread either of these practices are; Neither have been common in groups I’ve played in, but I don’t know that I have a big sample.

It would seem to me that music might break immersion in the game at times--at least popular music--as it might have very different associations for a person or take them out of the game at hand. Then again, immersion isn’t terribly important to all people or all games at all times--and it’s not like plenty of other distractions don’t present themselves that have no possiblity of game enhancement.

I can think of one game I ran where we did use music and sound effects where it very much enhanced everyone’s enjoyment. In a FASA Star Trek game back in the nineties (when dinosaurs ruled the Earth) we approached the sessions as if they were episodes of a Trek TV series. We would begin with a teaser or cold open to sort of get the adventure started, then my friend whose house we played at would cue up the theme song on his computer. Periodically, we’d also interject appropriate turbolift, transporter, or computer sounds--not always, but enough to remind us of the sensory environment of the world we were trying to emulate.

Those touches and a group of players who were all knowledgeable Star Trek fans made that the best media property based game I’ve played. I’ve dabbled in a fair number of licensed rpgs over the years, but none of the have ever come close.

So what about you guys: experiences good, bad, or otherwise with music and sound effects in games?

I Walked with a Xombi

A trip to the comic book store last week informed me that the new Xombi series from DC I had been anticipating had already arrived. Issue #3 was on the stands, in fact. Not wanting to jump in there, I haven’t started the new series yet, but the original was one of my favorites. It may just the the best bit of 1990s Vertigo-esque weirdness not done at Vertigo.

Xombi debuted (with an (at the time) trendy 0 issue) from Milestone in January 1994. It was the creation of writer John Rozum and artist Denys Cowan. The titular Xombi is David Kim, a scientist working with a nanotechnological virus for tissue regeneration. Kim is gravely injured when the villainous Dr. Sugarman attempts to steal the still-untested virus. Kim's assistant injects him with the nanovirus, saving his life--but at a price. Kim awakens to fine his poor assistant has been partially devoured by the nanites, scavenging for raw materials to rebuild him.

The now enhanced Kim is virtually indestructible and potentially immortal (a “xombi”)--and this is only the beginning of the weirdness. Kim becomes involved in the struggles of various supernatural forces secretly living among humanity.

It’s the offbeat cast of supporting characters and villains are really what made Xombi great. The evil Dr. Sugarman uses spindly, mummy-wrapped beings called “rustling husks” as henchmen--homonculi created from the corpses of insects that died trapped between window panes. Kim’s allies include the clairvoyant Nun of the Above, and her superpowered junior associate Catholic Girl. There’s also Rabbi Sinnowitz, an occult expert and golem manufacturer, and another Xombi--this one created by magic in ancient Africa. Did I mention the siblings Manuel and Manuella Dexterity? It’s just that kind of book.

I’m hoping for more of the same from the new series. The original Xombi is good read, particularly if one likes nineties-style quirk comic weirdness. Too bad it hasn't been collected yet.  It would be great inspiration for modern occult conspiracy games like Unknown Armies, but it has ideas that could be put to use in horror or supers games as well.

Arriving at the City

It’s been a long time coming, but the Warriors & Warlocks game I was GMing is drawing to close, and I’m going to be running a game set in the City. Hopefully, I’m going to have a couple of new players joining as well--two folks whose games I’ve had the pleasure of playing in--who were interested in getting in on a City-based game.

One of the questions has been: What system? I wanted something fairly “rules lite”--I have better things to do than learn and adapt a complicated new system. It also needs to be fairly amenable to tweaking since I wanted some rules elements to reflect the setting.

I was initially thinking of using Labyrinth Lord as my base, but I’ve recently changed my mind. Stuart Robertson’s Weird West has the elements I like in old school systems distilled to their basic elements, and given a little more flexibility, thereby.  

So as I gear up for the game, I’ll be talking about some of my modifications. Honestly, I’m not as much of a rules-fiddler as I was in my youth. This heresy in some circles, no doubt, but "perfection" of rules just just doesn’t interest me that much, now (though I’m glad it interests others, so I can benefit from the fruits of that interest) .

Like I said, I'll make some modifications/additions, though.  I've already thought about some cosmetic changes.  I thnk I'll rename Skill; It seems like the name confuses some people initially as they think of it as representing knowledge, whereas mechanically, it stands in for dexterity and physical skill.  Maybe "knack" or just back to "dexterity?"  Likewise, I may broaden Magic to "knowledge" which more broadly reflects its game use (though I don't find that name as snappy, admittedly).
   
I think magic will be something that gets some attention--not so much to change the basics, but to add some detail in keeping with the diversity of magical practice among Weird Adventures setting spellcasters.  Like I say, I think the basic system is resilient and can handle these additions with little fuss. 

Anyway, more to follow in days to come.   And of course, my choice of system for my game won't affect Weird Adventures--which is designed to be rules lite to begin with, but uses the OGL where it does touch upon rules elements (like monsters).

Trouble with Doubles

“Listen to me! Please listen! If you don't, if you won't, if you fail to understand, then the same incredible terror that's menacing me WILL STRIKE AT YOU!”
-Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) trailer

So might one hear some paranoid derelict rant on the streets of the City--and they just might happen to be right. The creatures called "doubles" are one of the insidious tools of subversion used by the Reds in their tireless attempt to remake the world in the image of their freedomless subterranean society.

Doubles are either an artificial lifeform created by the Reds or their former (now extinct) masters or “natural” underground creatures--perhaps selectively bred over generations to optimize their utility. Whatever their origins, doubles are force grown in gestation pods then sent to surface world to steal the identity of humans and replace them. Normally, they're spindly, vaguely humanoid creatures, unsettling in their bland featurelessness, but they can perfectly assume the form of anyone they mimic. Without the use of magic or medical tests, only the unsual glow of their eyes that can be glimpsed in certain lighting conditions gives them away--a situation the doubles seek to avoid if they can help it.

The doubles must observer humans they plan to duplicate. The longer and more detailed the observation, the better the duplication in terms of appearance and behavior. This is often accomplished by the surveillance devices of the Reds. Doubles can change forms on the fly, but their mimicry won’t be as convincing.

It’s believed Reds mostly target government officials or other important figures for replacement, but given the psychological warfare they wage against humanity, they aren’t above random replacement of regular individuals simply as an act of terror.

[Doubles are, of course, doppelgangers with a new veneer for the Strange New World. This version would work just as well in a pulp, atomic age, conspiracy, or maybe even supers game, though.]

Send in the Clowns

From The Mundy Guide to the City: A Comphrensive Guide to the Five Baronies of the Metropolis:

The neighborhood of Little Carcosa is one of the City’s most mysterious ethnic enclaves. It’s narrow, cobblestone streets, exotically dressed residents, and unusual scents given the feeling of stepping into the Old World--though where in the Old World is part of the mystery. The Carcosan homeland doesn't appear on any known map.

The people of Little Carcosa are as enigmatic as their homeland's location. Their swarthy complexions and the cadences of their speech recall the Near East, perhaps some place in Empire of Korambeck. Their clothing, manners, and ever present smiles make one think instead of the Orient and Yian.

Besides its general ambience, Little Carcosa holds other delights for the visitor. Its markets are small, but often have unusual items imported from all over the globe. The primary local craft is hand carved masks, both fanciful and grotesque, which are sought by a small, but dedicated, group of collectors. The spicy cuisine is an acquired taste, but many City gourmets extoll its exotic charms.

A rare treat is Little Carcosa’s street festival. It’s occurrence is hard to predict based as it is on an arcane sidereal calendar, but the Carcosans must plan for it well in advance, despite no outward preparation apparent to outsiders. Young and old alike take to the streets in masks, forming a raucous procession following a group of clowns. These clowns are apparently master contortionists (and possibly even illusionists of some sort) performing feats that scarcely seem humanly possible, and sometimes border on grotesque.

Outsiders are urged to leave after the the main part of the procession has past for their own safety. A final performer sometimes follows the parade, wearing a pale mask, and dressed in yellow, tattered robes, his appearance tends to whip the already excited crowd into a frenzy. While there have been no verified cases of violence, and urban legends of disappearances or mental breakdowns are certainly simply that, the intensity of the proceedings may be beyond the comfort of the casual visitor.

Warlord Wednesday: Conspiracy

Let's re-enter the lost world with another installment of my issue by issue examination of DC Comic's Warlord, the earlier installments of which can be found here...

"Conspiracy"

Warlord (vol. 1) #56 (April 1982)

Written by Mike Grell (Sharon Grell); Penciled by Mark Texiera; Inked by Pablo Marcos

Synopsis: In the back alleys of Shamballah, a group of street urchins gang up on another young boy--a boy they know as “Tinder,” but we know as Joshua, the lost son of the Warlord. The urchins want Tinder’s armlet (really a wristwatch given to him as a baby by his father), but he refuses and holds his own against them. He’s been toughened up by life on the streets since his adopted parents were killed by the Therans.

The urchins are finally dispersed by their Fagin, a mustachioed man named Darvin. He offers Tinder a place to stay and a place in his gang, but when he gets too close to the armlet himself, Tinder warns him off with a knife. Darvin considers killing the boy and taking it, but then he intuits in some vague way that its worth more with the boy than without. Instead, he reiterates his invitation, and Tinder joins him.

Meanwhile, in the palace, Morgan is in his fancy duds (last seen in Kaambuka) and is putting his adventuring accoutrements away in a chest. Shutting that chest is a momentous thing for Morgan, but when he discovers Tara watching him he takes her up in his arms and leaves it behind.

Elsewhere, a conspiracy is set in motion by Morgan’s return. Praydor, one of the treasonous plotters, makes his way from the palace to rooms in a bad part of town. There he meets a man whose features are in shadow, but we’re told he’s an impersonator of some sort. He’s tired of waiting and he’s eager for his costume to arrive. Praydor assures him it will be there soon. He also asks what they’ll do with the “package” once they’ve gotten it. Praydor tells him they’ll turn it over to Darvin, who’s possessed of a deep dungeon. Praydor takes his leave with one last instruction to the other man: “Make your move soon.”

Back in the palace, Morgan and Tara discuss politics. Morgan’s planned reforms for Shamballah don’t sit well with some people in power. Tara’s even heard rumors of an overthrow plot, but hasn’t been able to confirm them. A council meeting soon follows, and Morgan is at odds with some on the council and ends up storming out in anger.

Tara finds him in a garden hitting rocks with a stick. She assures him they’ll implement his ideas eventually; they’ll just have to get around the council. Their conversation is interrupted by a servant, Remald, who brings Tara a message that there's a man seeking an audience with her. He told Remald to recite a for Tara the poem “One Dark Rose,” and Tara smiles as she realizes who the visitor is. She leaves Morgan in the garden. Morgan soon gets irritated--and curious. He goes looking for Tara and finds:

Tara introduces her old friend Graemore, and introduces Morgan to him as her “royal consort.”

Morgan quickly excuses himself and goes to his chambers. He looks at himself critically in the mirror. He flexes his biceps. “Face it Morgan,” he tells himself, “You’re old, and that guy isn’t.” He turns from the mirror--but glimpses that his image doesn’t turn with him. Perplexed, he swings around to look at it. It smiles at him, gloatingly.

And then he’s knocked out by Praydor’s blow to the back of his head.
 
Things to Notice:

• This is the first appearance of Graemore--who looks like cross between a seventies rocker and Robin Hood in this issue.
• We're never told what exactly Morgan's "radical" plans for Shamballah are.
• Morgan's vanity comes to the fore when he's out of his element.

Where It Comes From:
Political intrigues with duplicates are a staple of adventure fiction.  The grandfather of this trope may well be L'homme au masque de fer (The Man in the Iron Mask), the final section of Alexandre Dumas' The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later--the last novel in the D'Artagnan series.  We'll see more of this next issue.

(Pre-)Summer Reading

I don’t care what the calendar says: 98 degrees is an evocation of summer if there ever was one. Close enough at least to mention some vacation reading selections that could also provide some rpg inspiration.

Leviathan, and its sequel Behemoth (and Goliath on the way) by Scott Westerfield imagine a quite different World War I where the Entente Powers are Darwinists (utlizing “fabricated” animals as technology) and the Triple Alliance are Clankers utilizing mechanical technology far advanced of our real history. I suppose the setting might be called steampunk, but the mechanical technology is firmly hydrocarbon-powered, and the biotech adds a new angle. The series follows Deryn Sharp--a Scottish girl masquerading as a boy so she can join the British Air Service, who winds up serving on the bioengineered airship, Leviathan, and Aleksander of Hapsburg--secret heir to Austro-Hungarian Empire, currently being hunted by his country’s German allies.

There is, of course, the hint of possible romance between the two, and conveniently the adults are often out of the way so our teen protagonists can save the day (these are YA novels), but there's plenty of action--and beyond that--there’s a lot of interesting worldbuilding and plenty of neat alternate tech for any sort of rpg. Then there’s the great illustrations by Keith Thompson to really inspire:

The Half-Made World by Felix Gilman is also about a Great War, but this one is in a fantasy (rather than science fiction) context. The West--a part of the world only becoming “stable” as it's settled by humanity--has become a battleground between two groups controlled by inhuman powers. The agents of the Gun are notorious outlaws, given superhuman abilities by the demons inhabiting the firearms they carry.  The people of the Line live regimented, industrial lives in the service of 28 sentient Engines. Caught in between are the mass of unaligned humanity, and the mysterious and powerful Folk--the original, nonhuman inhabitants of the West. The knowledge that there is a weapon--a thing of the Folk--that could end the war sets in motion a race to retreive the one, brain-damaged man that may know its whereabouts. This man, an aging general, and his hapless doctor get caught between the forces of Gun and Line.

One caveat: there's a sequel coming, so it's not "done in one."  Don't let that dissuade you.  Gilman’s world has a lot of great ideas to steal for an rpg setting, and gives great example of non-medieval secondary world fantasy to stand beside those of Mieville, VanderMeer, and King.