Weird Revisited: Sectaur Gear

I originally posted these in 2016...

These are model sheets for the Sectaurs cartoon. The items depicted here should had a little post-apocalyptic strangeness to any treasure haul:

Find more here.

Wednesday Comics: DC, June 1985 (week 2)

I'm reading DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) through Crisis! This week, I read the comics released the week of March 14, 1985.

Superman #408: Hannigan/Kupperberg and Swan/Williamson deliver a pretty interesting story for a Superman title of the era, dealing with a topic that will come to the fore in more "serious" works later: How much control should Superman exert over humanity in the name of saving us? The backdrop for this dilemma is the looming threat of nuclear war, perhaps inspired by the airing of the British TV film Threads on Superstation TBS earlier in 1985, or perhaps it was just part of the zeitgeist that led to films such as The Day After and Threads. In any case, Superman is having nightmares about a being the sole survivor of a nuclear war as the breakdown of nuclear talks is in the news. He considers deactivating the worlds' nukes but is unsure whether that is the best choice. An interaction with the Lori Lemaris' people in Atlantis, where he misjudges the situation, then one with a group of teens in a misadventure to regain a baseball from a junkyard, leads him to conclude that he should have faith in humanity, and be there when they need him but let them learn and take risks. His faith seems rewarded as the news reports nuclear talks resumed.

The second story by Bridwell and Swan/Rubenstein is more conventional. Superman stops an alien race in a generation ship from warring among themselves and finds a new planet for them to live upon.

Amethyst #6: Mishkin/Cohn and Estrada/Smith have Amethyst teaming up with Sardonyx who was being forced to kill Citrina by Fire Jade if he wanted to get his kingdom and family back alive. With the aid of a mysterious stranger who turns out to be the presumed dead Prince Garnet, the two return the kingdom of Sardonyx to Gemworld from the weird other realm where it had been sent.

Arak Son of Thunder #45: The Thomases, Lofficiers, and Forton/DeZuniga continue the voyages of the Arak and friends in the Karama. Near the island of Serendeeb, they encounter a beautiful, flying, green girl with butterfly wings. The king demands the girl's return, but Alsind has fallen in love and runs off with her. The king commands Arak and friends bring the girl back or a quantity of gems equal to the king's weight. In the jungles, they discover the weird life cycle of the weird woman--they turn from butterfly women to voracious giant caterpillars. They are forced to kill the creature to save Alsind.

Batman #384: Moench and Hoberg/Nebres have the remnants of Dr. Fang's gang get in touch with the Monitor (which seems like it places this story prior to the beginning of Crisis). He calls on Calendar Man (who hasn't appeared since issue 312 in 1979) who plans a series of crimes to culminate on March 21. Calendar Man is certainly a lesser Batman rogue, but Moench makes him suitably threatening. Meanwhile, Batman finds confirmation that Catwoman is still alive, and Vicki Vale breaks up with Bruce Wayne.

Flash #346: Bates and Infantino keep on going, and at least there's a break in the trial "action." As the cover gives away, the Reverse Flash appears to be back and boasts he's going to kill the Flash like everyone thought the Flash killed him. Meanwhile, Cecile's courtroom stunt last issue sends Fiona into another psychiatric tailspin, so the Flash vows to himself to let Barry Allen stay "dead" to aid her recovery. He also reveals his true identity to Cecile and reveals how he got a different face (as we saw when the plastic surgeons of Gorilla City did reconstructive work on him back in issue 342).

Jemm, Son of Saturn #10: The angry job of Red Saturnians, incited by the rogue priest, are prepared to kill Jemm, but with Luthor's help, the alien prince rallies and makes his escape. He's still very weak, which is a problem because the White Saturnians are preparing a final assault, and thanks to Jemm's actions last issue, New Bhok's defenses are weakened. 

Synn's been experiencing an illness than sounds suspiciously like morning sickness, which may be a problem for her concubine. Meanwhile, Tull is draining all of the power of the Koolar he was given, but Crazy Freddie, Luther's brother, and Bouncer are joining forces in the hopes of taking him down.

Legion of Super-Heroes #11: Levitz and Colon/Mahlstedt present a story focused on the founding Legion members: Cosmic Boy, Saturn Girl, and Lightning Lad. The three are feeling their age now (though they are presumably not even 30 yet!) and wanting to get on with their lives beyond the Legion. 

What better way to take a trip down memory lane than to visit Glacier Point, Antarctica, the minimum-security prison where the men who tried to assassinate RJ Brande and thus were the catalyst for the formation of the Legion are about to be released. The men and all the other prisoners seem oddly passive, and the three are uncertain how they feel about the prison.

Back at Legion Headquarters, Bouncing Boy is reviewing applicants with an eye toward expanding the team. Superboy shows up and he regales him with (courtesy of Levitz and Giffen/Kessel) the story of his first meeting with trainee Comet Queen.

Omega Men #25: Klein and McManus/Smith continue their new direction for the series. The Omega Men are captive on the strange planet, Wombworld, where they are subject to a Psion experiment that shifts their powers, and they encounter a creature named Piper who appears to age rapidly. They assist him on his request to locate "Twilla." While I haven't made up my mind about the new direction yet, McManus's art does a great job of evoking the "space fantasy" vibe.

In a "Tales of Vega" short by Moore and Cullins, a anthropologist studying the mating habits single-sex inhabitants of the planet Culacon, abandons any scientific distance in her dubious pursuit of firsthand knowledge and meets a sad end as she learns who they manage to reproduce without apparent females.

Star Trek #15: Barr and Sutton/Villagran bring their Mirror Universe arc to a satisfying conclusion. First though, Kirk and company have to convince the Klingons and Romulans to ally with them to cripple the Empire. Both ultimately agree, though both plan to betray our heroes (and each other) pretty much the moment that's accomplished. The Excelsior crew reveal their plan to cripple the computer systems of all Imperial vessels, exploiting their different technological development. Their plans and complicated by two things: Mirror-Saavik having secretly replaced original Saavik, and an Imperial attack fleet advancing quickly under the command of Blaine, the Imperial officer Kirk humiliated a few issues back. Needless to say, Kirk and his crew are one step ahead of everybody, though they have to do some improvising on the fly. With all the major powers of this universe humbled, Excelsior heads for home, having given a boost to the rebellion to be led by Mirror-David and Mirror-Spock.

Petty Wizardry, illustrated

Jason Sholtis

Friday, I shared a peak at how Spells Against Civility, the short comic Jason Sholtis and I were doing for the Sword & Sorcery magazine Swords Against! currently in crowdfunding.

I mentioned that Jason and I were doing this in the "Marvel Method," which is to say that he's drawing story not from a panel-by-panel script, but instead from a plot, then I'm scripting the dialogue and captions from his pages (and then lettering the script on the pages. We're a two man operation!).

Above you see a bit of the finished artwork for page one, but here is the rough of that entire page:

Dungeons & Baubles

The Revenger Trilogy is a series of science fiction novels by Alastair Reynolds. In a future millions of years hence, there is a spacefaring civilization amid ancient habitats that form a Dyson Swarm around the sun. Sisters Adrana and Arafura Ness flee their stifling life of wealth to become "bone readers" aboard a solar sail privateer searching for ancient, technological artifacts. 

Things don't go simply easily, as their ship falls prey to the infamous pirate, Bosa Sennen. From that encounter, the sisters are propelled into danger and more adventure than they ever wanted, and ultimately, the deep mysteries of their civilization.

The books are highly enjoyable in their own right, and the world would make a great rpg setting, but beyond that, I think that, in part, they are excellent inspiration for dungeoncrawling sort of adventure in any setting.

Working Class Treasure Hunters

The "dying in holes in the ground" aspect of low-level D&D beloved by old school play is poorly represented in the fiction of Appendix N, but the Revenger series very much portrays this sort of thing. Privateer crews are typically hard luck folks with scars, missing limbs, and stories of former comrades lost in the pursuit of that elusive big score. Such crewmembers have specialties: readers, openers, appraisers, to be efficient in the unglamorous work of seeking out treasures. These treasures are often strange--not as strange as things brought from the Zone in Roadside Picnic--but things that the current civilization can't make nor sometimes even guess their intended purpose. In these novels, these items often function as low level, utilitarian magic items.

Dungeon Lore

Having good intelligence on Baubles is a crucial part of "cracking" them. Baubles are surrounded by force fields that only open at certain times and openers rely on information from other privateers and their own readings and calculations to augur the time and duration of openings. Acquired maps are also essential for efficient and profitable "delves." Baubles have colorful names like His Foulness, the Cuckoo, Wedza's Eye, and the Yellow Jester, and their own internal arrangements and hazards.

Creative Uses

I mentioned before items brought out of Baubles, well their are obvious things of value like quoins (their unit of money), robots, or energy weapons, but also things that can be used less obviously in the privateers life. Bosa Sennen's dread ship has near invisible black sails made from catch cloth found in Baubles: a material that responds to some unknown and otherwise undetected emanation of the sun. Privateers prize even small peices of look stone, a strange glass-like substance that when peered through allows the ability to see through solid object. 

The Revenger series presents, in part, professional treasure hunters focused on resource-oriented and practical aspects of their trade. There are few "monsters" presented--just the pirates and one other threat I won't give away. The dangers are traps or merely hazardous aspects of the environment.  These aspects make more solid inspirations for elements of D&D that don't usually get much of a showcase in fiction.

Wednesday Comics: DC, June 1985 (week 1)

My mission: to read DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to the end of Crisis. This week, I'm looking at the comics that were on stands in the week of March 7, 1985. 

Best of DC #61: I haven't reviewed these digests since the earliest days of this blog series, but since I have mentioned this issue many times and how great I thought it was in my childhood (and I still do), I thought I should note it. If you only wanted to read one anthology of late pre-Crisis DC material to judge what it had to offer, this would be the one. We've got "Anatomy Lesson" from Swamp Thing, "Who is Donna Troy?" from New Teen Titans, "Guess What's Coming to Dinner?"from Legion of Super-Heroes, and "Final Duties" from Green Lantern, then lesser, but still notable stories: "Babe's Story" from Atari Force, "Killers Also Smile" from Sgt. Rock, "Viva Nebiros" from Blue Devil, and "If Superman Didn't Exist..." from Action Comics.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #3: I bought this issue off the stands as well. We get introduced to Alexander Luthor, last survivor of Earth-Three and an adolescent now composed of both matter and antimatter. He's in the care of the Monitor. Harbinger, meanwhile, is preparing for her betrayal.

Flash is somehow in the future (his series will get around to this, I'm sure!) and to escape a wall of antimatter, begins vibrating his molecules back in time--which again leads to us seeing him giving a desperate warning to Batman and the Outsiders and the Teen Titans in the 20th Century, as they try to save people from the antimatter wave in New York. Also in the present, though out in space, Brainiac becomes concerned about events and decides to seek out Lex Luthor.

In Markovia in 1944, the Monitor's chosen, Blue Beetle, Dr. Polaris, and Geo-Force, wind up fighting alongside a who's who of DC's war comics characters: Sgt. Rock and Easy, Stuart's Raiders, and the Losers. Those last wind up losing their lives to shadow demons.

Cyborg, Green Lantern, Psimon and Firebrand arrive in Texas in 1879. They meet up with several Western heroes including, Nighthawk, Scalphunter, Bat Lash, Johnny Thunder and Jonah Hex. The two disparate groups join forces and fight the shadow demons. Either what happens isn't clear or I missed something, but somehow Nighthawk winds up in a separate place from the group and is taken by the antimatter wave riding towards a town.

Other heroes fall: Psycho Kid is taken by the wave in the 30th Century. In Earth-AD, Solovar succumbs to his injuries suffered last issue. We're only 3 issues in and things are looking bad for the heroes!

Atari Force #18: Baron and Bareto/Villagran open with Tempest escaping from detention on New Earth, but he spends much of the issue lost in weirder corners of the multiverse until Dart is able to guide him to Scanner One. Scanner One has to get back home because supplies are running low, but the navigational path is a treacherous one. Dart, based on her vision, volunteers Blackjak for the task, and ultimately, Martin relents. Blackjak's new eye makes it an all but impossible task, but the Tazlings restore his mechanical one in time for him to get them to safety.

In the Hukka backup by Manak and Rogers/Delbeato, Young Christopher Champion takes Hukka with shopping with him to buy some action figures, but Hukka stays behind and the store closes. He gets chased by the security patrol dog. Christopher, realizing his pet is missing, uses his phasing powers to rescue the critter.

DC Comics Presents #82: Bates's story here is pretty good but elevated by Janson's art. Alanna is having recurrent nightmares and when she begins to mumble in Kryptonian, Adam Strange calls in Superman. It turns out Alanna is possessed by a Kryptonian demoness called Zazura, who is out to destroy Rann. When they figure out her presence on Rann is due to it passing through the area of space where Krypton was when it was destroyed 30 years ago, they are able to use a crystal harvested from Krypton's dust to weaken and destroy her. Superman also gets a chance to commune with other spirits of his lost homeworld, those of its people.

Fury of Firestorm #3: This issue isn't Kayanan's or Kupperberg's best interior art, though the cover is nice. Perhaps it was rushed? Storywise, Conway picks up where last issue left off, with Firestorm having been left for dead, Stein silent, apparently unconscious, and the Killer Frost/Plastique team headed for Niagara Falls. Firestorm pursues them, and luckily, he's helped in this second round by Firehawk. He takes down Plastique while Firehawk deals with Killer Frost. Later, Ronnie visits Stein in the hospital as he recovers from a concussion. Though he will miss him when the Professor moves to Pittsburgh, he now feels better able to go on without him--but when Doreen mentions college to him, Ronnie begins thinking that they can both go to school in Pittsburgh!

Jonni Thunder #3: Turns out Red Nails isn't just an exotic entertainer and club owner, she's also very much in the know regarding the statue and apparently able to put together an electrical super-weapon to threaten the city, cribbed from Tesla's notes! Jonni and Harrison Trump have to make common cause to escape Red and her Glamazons (that's what they're called!), then thwart her super-weapon. In between all that, 'Slim' Chance makes yet another attempt to steal the Thunderbolt statue.

Justice League of America #238: In the beginning of the issue, Conway and Hoberg/Patton address the continuity problems created by Superman, Wonder Woman, and Flash being away for "weeks" while the old JLA was disbanded and a new one formed, all while having ongoing adventures in their own titles--and Flash even being on trial. The solution: "Crisis did it," which may make this the first appearance of that explanation that will get used quite a bit in years to come. The issue ends with the 3 going back in time via Flash's treadmill to not "create a paradox."

That out of the way, we get down to Vixen having her final confrontation with her uncle. He kidnaps Mother Windom to provoke her, and Aquaman seems to use his telepathy to briefly stop her from going after him, but Martian Manhunter intervenes and reproves him for his coercive tactics. Maksai dies as a result of his actions, and Vixen's father is avenged.

Shadow War of Hawkman #2: The editorial notes in place of a letter column in this issue make clear that Isabella is engaged in sort of Thomas-like retcon and streamlining of the Hawk mythos, which I suppose makes this the first in an almost continuous history of such from the mid-80s on. In the main story, the Shadow War continues with the murder of a mutant who is just practicing with his flight powers. In Midway City, Katar Hol prepares to go after the attackers. He tracks them to their cave hideout and meets their leader Fell Andar. He first has the upper hand, but they manage to capture him when he is shocked by his discovery that they are Thanagarians.

Tales of the Teen Titans #54: Buckler does interior pencils here, though Barreto proves the cover. The trial of the Flash uh, Terminator continues, and it isn't going well, because in the New York state of the DCU if they don't have an admitted super-criminal super-soldier with links to a terrorist organization beyond a reasonable doubt on a murder wrap, they've just gotta let him go! So decides Judge Adrian (Vigilante) Chase. Anyway, Slade is helped in escaping justice by the mysterious impersonator who creates doubt that he is in fact the Terminator. This turns out to be Gar Logan using Mento's helmet to project an image. He wants Slade free to he can seek his own justice. Meanwhile, Azrael pines for Lilith and Lilith wonders about his past. This stuff might build tension if it all hadn't been explored in the past couple of issues of the sister title.

Vigilante #18: After painting Linnaker as a relentless killer last issue, Moore and Biakie move to at least humanize him a bit by revealing his thoughts in a letter he wrote to his daughter from prison. As he searches for a way to get out of town with a terrified Jodie, Fever and Vigilante keep up their uneasy partnership to try to track the two down. In the end, Vigilante and Linnaker engage in a brutal fight, but Jodie grabs a gun and shoots Vigilante, not her father. Fever runs over Linnaker with a car, however, and keeps on doing it until he's definitely dead. Jodie in horror starts to shoot her, but Vigilante takes the gun. In the aftermath, Vigilante is trouble by all of this, and by what he read in Linnaker's unsent letter, including attacks on the hyprocrisy of society and the nature of judgement. 

A New World

With our Land of Azurth campaign nearing its conclusion, I've been thinking about what might come after. Or more truthfully, I've thought of several things that could come after in the last few months as I've felt the end was nigh.

Currently, I've been considering a variation on an idea I've had before: a high adventure occasionally dungeoneering fantasy world inspired by Japanese Standard (Western) Fantasy. Magitech will plan a big role in the setting, and there will be a loose approach to anachronism (even looser than standard D&D settings). This sort of setting will also support the expansive "ancestries" available these days in 5e and high action combat.

The incursion of "demons" (more like the broader D&Dism of fiends than the specifically chaotic evil variety) in service of a Demon King that will reside in the dark side of the physical world rather than a separate plane. I think the world will be shape like an inverted bowl with the demon world being within the concave surface. The "rim" will be the Terminator, a region that never sees more of the sun than twilight and holds numerous lonely fortifications to watch for demonic incursion.

To the extent that it will be variant from standard D&D, I don't worry much about my players accepting it. They've been playing in Azurth for over a decade so that shouldn't be a problem! I do want it to be distinct from Azurth though to provide a somewhat different experience.

In the Shadows

In the Latter Ages of Earth, it is known that the scientist mages of more lucent eras spoke of an invisible, co-existing realm. Scholars know this as the Plane of Shadow. It is long been rumored that there are artifacts allowing minds or shadows to be translated into this shadow realm. These legendary artifacts are known as black mirrors. 

The Plane of Shadow is no ethereal realm, but a place of matter as solid as any, but it remains aloof and invisible. It only interaction is with gravity, so that there might well be whole ecologies of this shadow matter upon the Earth unknown to the mundane world. 

If the black mirrors truly exist, it implies that there is or once was, a civilization or entity on the other side capable of constructing some sort of form for a mind passing through. If such a Shadow or intelligence civilization exists, they could well have some means of sending agents into the world of mundane matter as well.