Magic and Science

In the chat Q&A and a couple email exchanges, I’ve gotten questions about the relationship of magic and science in the world of Weird Adventures.  It seemed like a good time to do a post to clarify, as the setting doesn’t follow the strong separation of the two seen in a number of other rpgs or fictional worlds.

In the City and its world, what people call “science” and “magic” are areas of knowledge which together describe a spectrum of phenomena (or perhaps, phenomena and noumena). Science deals with the material world (the Prime Material Plane, specifically) and repeatable observations about things within that world.  Magic, on the other hand, deals with the interaction of other planes with the Material Plane.  While thaumaturgical studies have certainly led to repeated observations, the performer of a magical experiment is linked to the results, and the forces involved are not always measurable or observable.  

In the dim past or the modern age, the two areas of knowledge have never been completely separate.  Briefly, here let’s look at the spectrum of disciplines leading to technology in the modern City, from strictly physical to most metaphysical:

Science: Humanity’s accumulated knowledge and understanding of the physical world, without account for noumenal forces or extraplanar interactions. The results of this knowledge have produced technology usable by all.

Alchemy: A field focused on the magical or metaphysical properties and interactions of physical substances.  The dividing line between chemistry and alchemy is blurry; various individual experiments or techniques make greater or lesser use of magical interactions.  Alchemy can lead to mass produced products, though these are perhaps not as stable or predictable as the chemistry of our world. 

Artifice: When alchemists moved into the production of homunculi, and thaumaturgists into fashioning automata, the artificer's art was born. Constructs or automata can be made in factories, but their power supplies and mechanical brains (if they have them) are fashioned by alchemical or thaumaturgic means. These techniques can produce devices that might be termed “super-science”--like death-rays or anti-gravity.  Because of the heavy thaumaturgic influence needed, these sorts of devices aren’t mass-producible at the current level of technology,and instead are the work of lone genius (or mad) inventors.

Magic: The ancient art of effecting change in the physical world by will, i.e. the application of forces and powers often extraplanar in origin and not really measurable or detectable (except in their effects) by current scientific means. Thaumaturgy has laws, but these can be idiosyncratic, and often make more intuitive sense than strictly reasonable.

Take a look at the Weird Adventures Index for posts dealing with examples of these technologies.

Relax and Enjoy

Nothing goes better with a good beer than updates to the Weird Adventures Index.

You can check out a few monsters you might have missed, including the gill-men, the oh so sweet (and oh so deadly) candy zombies,  and the undead weirdness of the swarm of husks.  If travel reading is more what your in the mood for, then how about an exotic locale like Demiurge Island?  If you'd rather stay closer to home, you can enjoy that good beer in the bar at the Capricorn Hotel.

Maybe you like travels of a more metaphorical nature?  Then let the doors of perception open your third eye through the use of weird psychedelics or take a no less harrowing trip down some adventurer's photographic memory lane with the contents found in a shoebox.

Brain Games

Last nights WaRP Weird Adventures game opened with Erskine Loone getting an odd letter from an old grad school friend, William Carmody. Our heroes--joined by the mentally deficient pugilist Big Lenny--went over to Carmody's lab to see what was going on.  They find what's left of Carmody in the basement--and he asks them to solve his murder!

Carmody, at this point, is a brain floating in a vat of nutrients.  Only his scientific genius (and his trusty automaton Laurence) kept him alive.  Unfortunately, the trauma of his death and transformation left him with a good deal of memory loss.  He doesn't know who killed him.

He's got an idea as to why, though.  He's been working with an alien artifact in the form of a large dodecahedron.  He believes this could revolutionize the automata field, and so does his business partner, the aviator and inventor, Hew Hazzard.  Maybe Hazzard wanted the new technology all to himself?

Or maybe it's "Waxy" Moldoon--the Hell Syndicate boss Carmody borrowed start-up money from--that killed him.  He might want to get his mits on a valuable dingus like that.

Two good suspects--but Diabolico always wants to pin it on a dame. The one at hand (or not) is Carmody's  fiancée and lab assistant, Olimpia. She's now disappeared and Carmody thinks the murderer kidnapped her, but he doesn't really remember.

While they're trying to piece all this together, one of Carmody's automata prototypes becomes active somehow and goes on a short rampage.  Loone cuts the broadcast power just before it can decapitate Diabolico.

It's their first case in their own office, and looks like "Team Victory" has some dangerous work ahead.

Programming note: I'll be doing a Weird Adventures Q&A tonight at 8:00pm Eastern on rpgnet IRC. To join:  Go to http://www.magicstar.net/chat2/, select your nick, login, and type "/join #rpgnet"

Warlord Wednesday: 100!

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...

"Skartaris Unchained"

Warlord #100 (December 1985)

Written by Michael Fleisher; Art by Adam Kubert.

Synopsis: Following the information they acquired from Norrad’s scrolls last issue, Morgan and Krystovar are canoeing down a river in a canyon toward a back entrance to New Atlantis. The way isn’t complete smooth. They’ve just discovered the handholds in the rock face that provide a way to climb to the entrance when a giant crab attacks them. Morgan manages to stab then thing in the and kill it, but it’s death-throes send him flying toward the cliff face. Incredibly, Morgan manages to grab the handholds and even reach down to give Krystovar a hand up out of the river.

Morgan and Krystovar scale the cliff face, only to find their way in blocked by metal bars!

In the camps, Machiste and Mariah prepare to ride out on their mission. They will raise a banner to signal Tara and the Shamballan army when they’ve completed it. They’re banking on Sabertooth not expecting a second assault on occupied Shamballah after their recent defeat there. Mariah wonders if Tara is really going to be able to lead the army to victory without Morgan. Machiste replies that Tara is not only a queen, but the second most fearless warrior in Skartaris—after her husband, the Warlord.

With some work, Morgan manages to pry one of the bars loose. He and Krystovar squeeze into the small passage. They find it opens into:

There are guards patrolling the area, but our heroes keep to the shadows and put them down quickly before they can raise an alarm.

In Shamballah, a veiled woman leads a donkey pulling a cart into the market. She passes the guards without arousing suspicious—or maybe not:

Still, Machiste and Shakira get the drop on him.

Elsewhere, Graemore, looking to prove himself, arrives at the secret entrance to New Atlantis. He follows the path taken by Morgan and Krystovar. The minstrel isn’t as stealthy, though, and winds up getting captured. The guards raise and alarm, and Morgan and Krystovar will soon be discovered!

The Shamballan crew goes about their mission. Shakira sneaks into the armory and gets control of an energy cannon, allowing them to take the whole place. Machiste uses a rope and a grappling hook to scale the palace walls and take out the guardsmen there.

Krystovar are swarmed by guards at an entrance to the throne room flanked by two centaur statues. There’s no way both of them will make it. Krystovar urges Morgan to go on and get Cykroth while he holds this chokepoint. Morgan is reluctant to go, by Kystovar convinces him it must be done for the good of Skartaris.

Elsewhere, Jennifer Morgan sense her father’s battle with Cykroth the Wizard-King is about to begin:

In his sanctum, Cykroth hears the tumult. He calls for his guards, but someone else answers him:

And the battle is joined!

To Be Contined

Things to Notice:   

• Mike Grell returns to the series he created with a great cover.
• After so long laying the foundation, the end of Burkett's New Atlantis saga is penned by Michael Fleisher.

Notes:
While it's uncertain, last issue seems to have been written to set up a quick solution to the whole New Atlantean saga.  There are events to come suggesting dropped storylines, as we'll soon see.

The statues in the "temple of human sacrifice" seem lazily (and perhaps offensively) close to statutes of real world Hindu deities.

Hell's Hoods: Meet the Avernus Family

Damned souls fresh of Charon’s ferry from the Underworld, step off into Hell’s quarantine and processing centers. All this territory along the docks on the Acheron, is controlled by the Avernus crime family. It’s boss, Andras, was described yesterday. Now, let’s take a look at a few of his subordinates:

Murmur: Andras’s moll--and his underboss. She appears is a pale woman with straight, black hair, wearing a cloak of vulture feathers and little else. She wields an obsidian knife when forced to do so. She is an adept necromancer, and will summon the spirits of the dead for a summoner for interrogation. Murmur runs the processing center and ensures every one of the damned go to their appropriate reward.

Barbatos: The consigliere of family Avernus, he appears as a thickly-bearded old man dressed as an Old World peasant. He roams near the docks of the Acheron like a vagrant, mumbling to himself and setting simple traps for vermin. He could be just another of the damned, driven mad by his experiences. The old devil may be damned, but he is far from mad. He knows the languages of birds and animals. He’s adept at settling disputes, mostly in his family’s favor.

Flaures: A captain with the appearance of a humanoid leopard with flames dancing in his eyes. He’s sometimes mistaken for the Cat Lord--which is a good way to earn the Cat Lord’s ire. He dresses in dapper suits suggestive of Ascianan styles and smokes cigarettes in a holder. He performs most of his assassinations by fires. For a summoner, he can answer questions on past, present, and future, but is also willing to make contract hits on demons or devils.

Hell's Hoods: The Owl

The devil known as Andras the Owl is the current boss of the Avernus family in the Hell Syndicate. His family’s territory is closest to the Astral Plane. As long there as been a Hell, they've been tasked with the processing of new arrivals: both run-of-the-mill evil souls and those fulfilling general faustian contracts.  

Andras rose through the diabolic ranks as a hitman and since he became boss, the Avernus family has gone into the business of murder for hire.

In the modern age, Andras appears as a thin man with the head of an owl in an immaculate suit (of conservative cut) and gloves. His large, soulless eyes glow like headlamps.  He never speaks; communications are carried out through surrogates (sometimes a Hell Syndicate made man, other times a black dire wolf that accompanies him) with whom he seems to communicate telepathically. He smells like clove cigarettes. His angular, razor-edged shadow can cut creatures less than 1 HD that it falls on.

Combat: Andras uses knives of a silver-like material that cause wounds that will not heal normally. A favorite tactic is cutting a mortal’s face in a Cheshire grin, then coming back to kill them on a night of the new moon months or years later.  The blades will sublimate if exposed to sunlight in about an hour. He also has a high-powered rifle that appears to be made from the fossilized bone of a qlippothic beast and fires hell-glass bullets containing fragments of a sphere of annihilation. Any entity hit by them is sucked into the void contained within.

Diabolical Abilities: Andras's unblinking stare can cause severe inflammation of the eyes, resulting in temporary blindness.(lasts 1-10  rounds of successful saving throw, 2-20 days on failure). Once per encounter, he may issue the croaking cry of a night-raven which may cause fear in those who hear it.

Pacts: Andras will take contracts for hits on any mortal being, particularly if doing so will put others’ souls in peril. A petitioner must fatten 13 white mice on his own blood and then feed them to an owl of pure black plumage.  The petitioner must collect the regurgitated pellets and use them in the drawing of a ritual circle. Summoning wards must be strong; if Andras escapes he will most likely kill everyone present.  

In Oceans Deep

For a race that has long bedeviled the surface world, the gill-men remain mysterious. Any school child in the City knows the story of Horatio Stormalong who repelled the last incursion of the creatures, but the only modern account of them in their native habitat comes from the memoir of a journalist held hostage by the merman separatist and terrorist known as Nemo.

Nemo’s vessel seems to have been captured by the gill-men in the ocean’s depths and taken to a sunken ruin of ancient Meropis where the gill-men lived.  Though this point was never entirely clear, it seems the gill-men consider themselves the descendants of the Meropisians. If this is true, the forces led to their smaller stature and inhuman appearance are mysterious.

Gill-men seem a distinct species from the sea devils, who are larger with toothier maws and may be (horribly) interfertile with humans.  They also seem unrelated to whatever species the head of Thraug belongs too.

Nemo’s encounter with the gill-men shows they have made advances in technology since their last attempted invasion, even if not exactly at pace with humanity's.  This fact, combined with their belligerence and organization, suggests the gill-men remain a potential threat to the surface world. 

[Mechanically, treat the gill-men has aquatic versions of humanoids of some sort. Either goblins or hobgoblins.]

One of the divers from Nemo's vessel captured by Gill-Men