Cosmic Delving

"If you can leave your flat land thinking and think of many surfaces, one over the other, extending on and on under the water as well as under the land, you begin to understand. But you can’t really comprehend immensity, can’t comprehend a pioneer job that has been going on for hundreds and hundreds of years and is still only beginning."
- Richard Sharpe Shaver

Not all subterranean spaces exist wholly in this reality. The upper regions may be near mundane, and just beyond that merely stocked with the detritus of the visitor's own unconscious, but the deeper regions, the outer regions, bleed into the cosmic. These are the places that few venture purposely, but some freak pyschonauts do, risking sanity, body, and perhaps soul, for an elusive apotheosis.

One has to be prepared, of course. The delvers rely on protocols self-published and passed around by fringe theorists and weirdos. They hunt for cryptic hints in Forteana and pulp science fiction. The details are various, but in all regimens there must be some development of the avatar, the psychic projection of self that can slip from the mundane to the other realms. The avatars are themselves archetypes from the Jungian depths, ready for the hero's journey. Is your inner self Wizard or Warrior?

For the act of slipping itself, well, there's the chemical trigger.

The underworld isn't empty. It's populated by monsters to wound and frighten the delvers, and scattered with treasures to tempt them. Both the horrors and wonders are distractions to the true adept, though more than a few have contented themselves with some bauble from dream or nightmare, and an unbelievable story to tell.

The true seeker, however, keeps going. Down, down, down. And beyond.

A Report on Current Events in the Land of Azurth

The status quo of the Land of Azurth was laid out in my early posts on the it, but some things have changed over the years of the ongoing campaign. Here are some of the highlights:

Gladhand Out! Errol B. Gladhand, former Mayor of Rivertown in Yanth Country and patron of the PCs in my home group lost the most recent election to Drumpf, who's used his wizardly connections to turn Rivertown into something of an armed camp. Gladhand, convinced of electoral fraud, embroiled the PCs in a scheme to hire mercenaries to take back the city, but the results of that have yet to be seen.

The Unseen Princess. Viola, the Clockwork Prince of Yanth closed off her laboratory-palace and has been seen since before the election.

Under-Sea Revealed. The formerly half-mythical land of Under-Sea has been visited by the PCs and freed from the yoke of Toad Temple tyranny.

Cat Folk Do Exist. There were not supposed to be any Cat Folk in the Land of Azurth, but it turns out there is a small number. Calico Bonny of Rivertown's Floating World is one, as is her brother, the swashbuckling Calico Jack.

Wednesday Comics: Recent Collection Purchases

New comics have been pretty slim pickings over the pandemic, but I've still managed to pick up several collections over the weeks. Here are some high points:

Weird Western Tales: Jonah Hex
DC published two black & white Showcase Presents volumes (which are great), but this is the first time we've got these reprints in color.

The Rise and Fall of the Trigan Empire Volume One
I talked about Don Lawrence's Storm quite a bit here. This is a science fiction title he did for many years prior.

Flowers and Zombies

Last night's Land of Azurth 5e game found the party still in the hidden fane of the Black Lotus. The floral tiger creature that menaced them at the end of last session turned out to be friendly when Shade the Ranger used speak with animals to converse. The creature told her how it had been imprisoned by Zaad and its pollen stolen for the evil priest's purposes. The creature wouldn't take them there, but did clue them in that Zaad's "malignant heart" was on a upper floor of the fane.

The party went seeking the stairs. They discovered a room where some sort of wine was being made from the flowers they had found in the vats. They were confused by a weird hallway that seemed to reverse the direction of your travel. They sneaked past some arguing clerics in plate only to stumble right into a trap, when a portcullis came down on Dagmar!

The party was unable to lift it. They were all trapped when some guards attacked. Erekose's crossbow and Shade's bow won the day, though, and examination of their surroundings lead to the discovery of a secret door, though it was beyond their reach. Waylon's mage hand opened it and discovered a small room with a winch, presumably to lift the portcullis. Two mage hands in concert were able to turn it enough to give Dagmar space to crawl out. While she worked the winch, one of the enraged clerics attacked the party.

Erekose killed him, while Wayon took out another that emerged from a second secret door. Another guard had barricaded himself in a room, and bargained away a dead cleric's scroll to get them to leave him in peace.

The party turned their attentions back to the endless loop hall, and finally figured out the trick. They climbed the stairs to the second level and pretty quickly discovered a room full on zombies. They stood their ground, and soon piled up the newly un-undead corpses.

Valley of the Cracked Helm

Billy Longino has released a new adventure, Valley of the Cracked Helm. I haven't had a chance to run this one, but the pitch is:

Once a paradise at the heart of dwarfdom, the Valley of the Cracked Helm has lain forgotten for ages, lost to the vagaries of natural disasters, goblin invasions, and generational benders. Over the years since, its name has invoked only shame—furtive, deep-seated dwarven shame—for the valley is where the wild dwarves dwell. . .

For wild dwarves, you should read "dwarven nudists."

I have played in games run by Billy both at North Texas RPG Con and online. I feel confident this one is a good time. Check it out!

Dungeons of High Strangeness

Or High Weirdness, though that term might get it confused with "the weird," as in weird fiction, which is not wholly unrelated, but not exactly what I'm thinking of here. What I'm envisioning is a dungeon with a science fantasy bent, but not the typical pulp fiction ray guns thing. The dungeon here is a relic of the past, but something along the lines of the Dulce Base of conspiracy theory, or maybe a larger version of the underground facilities of Lost's Dharma Initiative.

Perhaps these bases are a relic from before some cataclysm, or maybe remnant of some intrusion from an alternate world (as recent or as remote as you like). Whichever, they represent something not as straightforward as the typical pulp science past because it's inspired by different material: Project Montauk, The Philadelphia Experiment, or an number of fictional weird conspiracy experiments.

The characters with their pseudo-Medieval perspective, probably wouldn't understand, but the players will, and the idea of unravelling just what the deal is with dungeons might appeal.

Return of the Space Wizards

This is another riff on a different sort of post-apocalyptic D&D.

There was once a human empire with dominion over many worlds. Despite its mastery of magic, the empire was eventually overthrown, but it's rulers made plans for its eventually return. They built the dungeons, caches of treasure and magic meant to tempt and challenge the humans who would come after, the unknowing heirs to a power that could be re-awakened, returning the long slumbering empire to its former glory!

Not only does this give a rationale for the existence of dungeons and a background that the players could uncover, but it potentially provides another ethical dilemma for the players. Do they support the re-awakening of the human empire or try to thwart it?