Games of Chance

The lights of Faro City beckon. It’s a place were fortunes are made, and a man can go from loser to ruler in the course of a night, if his luck holds. Of course, he can also lose everything just as quickly if it doesn’t.

Faro City lies to the south on a barrier island in the Meropic Ocean. It’s a beach resort for the City and places further north, famous for the hotels and attractions along its boardwalk. It’s infamous for its gambling and its means of government--it’s an aleatocracy, that’s rulers are decided by the outcomes in its gambling establishments.

Win at the tables, and you’re unknowingly entered in a secret game. Win in that game and you'll found yourself congratulated by the smiling men of the Gaming Commission, given expensive accommodations, the run of the town--and a silver chip.  Winners are expected to officiate at certain civic events, and to make public appearances.  So long as they don’t seriously disrupt the peace, silver level high rollers live like royalty until their winnings dry up, or another high roller is chosen. Typically, this about a week--sometimes a little more, others a little less. Departing high rollers get a draw from an ancient and mysterious card deck. The smiling men insist upon it. Those who refuse disappear. Those who draw--well, you hear stories, both fantastic and macabre. 

Some High Rollers have long winning streaks, and at some point the smiling men of the Gaming Commission return and give them a gold chip. Gold level high rollers keep living the high life, and can make decrees with the force of law--so long as they don’t disrupt the prosperity or customs of Faro City. They're obligated to act as magistrates, resolving minor disputes brought to them by citizens and visitors alike.  Most stay at the gold level a lunar month, and then they're offered their choice of abdication (and a draw from the ancient and mysterious deck) or a chance at an exclusive, high stakes game.

About this last game, there are only rumors. Some say its stud poker, on a demi-plane where time doesn’t pass, at a table with cardsharps representing Heaven, Hell, and lesser outer planar concerns.  Others say the game is a simple one card draw from a deck held by a veiled woman. The exact states are neve specified even in rumor, but everyone is sure it's an unimaginably big score.

Note: Other rumors concern the smiling men of the Gaming Commission.  Some say they're alien fortunavores--luck eaters--drawing sustenance from the high rollers and eventual-losers they've trapped in their big beachside honeypot.  Others suggest they're probability sorcerers, harnessing the power of the ancient and mysterious deck for some purpose, and the games in Faro City are their recruiting tool.  I'd hesitate to put odds on either theory.

Warlord Wednesday: By Ice and Fire -- Issue 50!

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...

"By Ice and Fire"

Warlord (vol. 1) #50 (October 1981)

Written and Illustrated by Mike Grell; inked by Bob Smith

Synopsis: On a sunlight peak above the shadowed Terminator, Morgan and Shakira look down at Castles Deimos. Morgan alludes to the bitter memories it holds for him. He’s interrupted in his painful reminiscence by the sound of approaching hoofbeats.

Minutes later, he and Shakira leap from ambush on to Tara and Aton! It takes a few moments for recognition to dawn, and Morgan has to break up Tara and Shakira’s scuffle--with predictable results:

All that settled, Tara explains that she was able to find Morgan because she knew he’d come to Castle Deimos. Morgan concedes that point--it is the place where he believes he was forced to kill their son. He says he has to go in and somehow put the ghosts of the past to rest. Then, he can move on and find Jennifer, his daughter.

Tara takes his hand and says they’ll do it together.

In the Age of the Wizard Kings, the desperate message sent via bat by Sarrgon Fire-Eye has made its way to Mungo Ironhand. Mungo helpful recaps Craetur’s transformation into the Evil One via the Necronomicon, and his subsequent usurption of Sarrgon’s castle for Mariah and Machiste. Machiste thinks Sarrgon got what he deserved, but Mungo suggests that an ancient prophecy warns of the Evil One and they must join up with Sarrgon and defeat him before he reaches his full power.

Back in the Skartarian era, in his castle, Deimos (what little is left of him) has Faaldren bring a now apparently catatonic Jennifer to him. Faaldren doesn’t want to hurt her, but Deimos commands him to silence as he continues to prepare his sorcerous ritual. In his pentacle he summons the witch Ashiya. She’s surprised to see him alive...and in the shape he's in:

Deimos reminds her of the Mask of Life (which she helped him acquire) which has left him undead and unable to die. Ashiya asks who the girl is, and Deimos replies its the Warlord’s daughter--and his future consort. This news doesn’t please Ashiya, who had her eye on that role.

Deimos can’t clone himself a new body as he has no living cells to use. Thinking of clones makes him ask after the clone they made of Morgan’s son. Ashiya lies and says she doesn’t know what happened to him. She also doesn’t let on that she switched the clone for the real boy.

Deimos knows she’s hiding something, but he’s got other things on his mind at the moment. He needs Ashiya’s help to perform a ritual so he can make a pact with the Evil One to get his body restored. The two quickly cast the spell, and Deimos finds himself facing the Evil One--who takes a jab at his appearance...

TO BE CONTINUED...Same Warlord Time, Same Warlord Channel!

Things to Notice:

• Ok, majority of issues rules: Zarrgon's name is actually Sarrgon.
• The Evil One talks in a more modern way, like the wizards of the Age of Wizard Kings, but unlike most denizens of Skartaris (and unlike his speech patterns as Craetur).
• Mariah and Machiste return after after being absent from the series since issue #41.

Where It Comes From:
This issue is the culmination of a number of plot elements.  We're still getting the origin of the Evil One, who issue #31 suggested might have precipitated the end of the Age of Wizard Kings. 

I'll save the rest of my comments for my review of the issue's second half.

Five Sinister Sorcerers

From the world of the City, here are five wielders of magic to challenge any party of adventurers:

The Algophilist: He’s older than current civilization, and he wants to make you hurt. His mistress is a goddess of pain, dead since the sinking of Meropis. Every tear evoked by her devoted servant, every scream and anguished cry he draws forth from his victims, brings his goddess incrementally closer to raising. Having learned (and suffered) at his goddess’ several hands for seven times seven years, the Algophilist knows numerous and varied ways to get his sacrifices. He can be met anywhere where the shadows make it easier for him to find victims, but he’s discovered a “backdoor” in and out of the alien city that overlaps with Hoborxen and often strikes from there, taking whoever mets his fancy to his sadist’s dungeon demiplane.

Hieronymus Gaunt: Lich and bon vivant (bon mourant?) currently on a world tour of debauchery and mayhem with a gang of followers in a stolen elephant-shaped hotel. In addition to his own sorcery, he's got a store of stolen magic items from all over the world.

Cheroot: Croaker (medicine man) and mugwump of a large hobogoblin tribe in the Steel League. He holds court in a large dump outside of Sunderland where he nightly incites the ‘goblins to ever greater crimes against humans. He wears a worn tophat which has the power to animate anything it is set upon (as long as it stays on it)--and Cheroot can command the animate to his service. The trash heap where he makes his throne is actually a garbage golem which will rise and fight for the shaman if needed.

Tsan Chan: Yianese nobleman, and leader of the Five-Headed Dragon Society crime cult. He rules from the shadows of San Tiburon’s Yiantown, commanding hundreds of axe-weilding soldier-fanatics willing to die at his command. For those who have particularly earned his displeasure, he sends his pet shadow dragon, who swims silently out of the night and drains foes of their very life.

The Unpleasant Woman in the Basement: What she lacks in looks, she doubly lacks in personality.  She squats like a gigantic toad amid the packages, correspondence, and pneumatic tubes in the basement mailroom of a midtown office building in the City. She's been there for fifty years and three building owners.  Those who displease her die in bizarre accidents or by suicide.  Nightgaunts fly at her whim. Scorpions will grow from her shed blood.

Nonfiction of the Apes

Can’t get enough of "Simian Saturday" over at the Green Skeleton Gaming Guild? Or perhaps your gearing up for a game of Terra Primate (somebody should be), or a some other post-apocalyptic game where now beasts rule?

Well I’ve got some nonfiction for you.

Hasslein Books (named, presumably for Dr. Otto Hasslein, originator of the Hasslein Curve) has produced two books of interest to the Planet of the Apes fan. The first is From Aldo to Zira: Lexicon of the Planet of the Apes which is an encyclopedia of everything in the POTA universe--and I do mean everything. Like there’s Apeslayer--which is to say the Marvel Comics UK version of Killraven where Wells' Martians get replaced by simian space invaders (but they’ve still got tripods). That’s only one obscurity to be fond in this near phonebook-sized tome.

The same author, Rich Handley, brings us the Timeline of the Planet of the Apes. This weaves (or perhaps stuffs might be a better word) the original film series, all the comic books, various novels, and even Burton’s 2001 re-imagining into a coherent--if not seamless--chronology. In addition to all this history there’s a cover gallery and index of resources.

While there have been some good critical works on POTA and its cultural impact, or on the making of the films, these are the only books chonricling the universe itself out there. The author takes a more inclusive view of other media than I might, but that certainly in no way diminishes the entertainment or game fodder value of the works.

Tales from the Graveyard

Barrow Island lies close to Empire Island in the Wyrd River. It’s the location of the City’s sprawling potter’s field, but its association with the dead goes back much farther. There are stately Dwergen cemeteries dating from the earliest days of colonization, and even unmarked Native burial grounds.

The only living inhabitants on the island are those that tend the graveyards. Over a hundred and fifty years ago, all the entire population of the island’s only village--some 700 souls--were found dead (and subsequently buried in a mass grave nearby). No further attempts at settlement were made. Still, the size of grounds to maintain and protect, and the large number of interments, necessitates a fairly large staff.

The graveyard staff (barrow men) are a clan of several interrelated families--”Keeper,” “Graves,” and “Digger” are among of the most common surnames. They’re usually a people of “unique” (one might say hideous) appearance, though their are exceptions particularly among the women. Whether this is from inbreeding, intermixing with their bitter enemies, the ghouls, or the dark influence of the island itself, is uncertain. Whatever the reason for their appearance, the barrow men are unperturbed by it--in fact, they seem to delight in the revulsion it sometimes causes in others.

The barrow men love a good tale, the more macabre the better--particularly if injected with a bit of gallows humor. They collect them, and swap them; the number known and their novelty are a measure of status among them. Any visitor to the island will almost surely be regaled with one or more depending on the length of their stay.

BARROW MEN (RACE)
Ability Modifiers: CON +1, CHA -1
Classes: All
Languages: Ghoulish
Racial Traits:

• +2 to savings throws vs. poison, disease, or contagion.
• horrify: If given time and opportunity (i.e. not in combat or other extremely active situation) a barrow man may enrapt listeners with a tale of horror. This works similar to the bardic fascinate abilty. After the tale is complete, a failed saving throw leaves the listener shaken with a -2 to all attack rolls and other checks for 1d4 rounds.

Random Queen Encounter Table

In 5837, on the fiftieth anniversary of Queen Victoriana’s acession to the throne of Grand Lludd, a plan was unveiled which was to assure that her reign and the glory that had accompanied it would never come to an end. The most trusted and skilled alchemists of the empire set about to great several clones of the queen, which were to be grown to adulthood in alchemical vats in a hidden underground complex--the Preserved Queen, she and her duplicates would be called. In the panic and chaos of the Great War, various factions of the government took it upon themselves to open vats prematurely, and perhaps some were damaged by the Staarkish bombardment and opened on their own. The result is that multiple iterations of the Queen may be encountered in the Lluddish Isles.

Given that various versions of the Queen are more likely to be encountered in certain places, this is really more of a random adventure table, than just one for a random encounter (roll d6):

1 - Queen Victoriana, Prima, born of woman: now over a hundred years old, but augmented with anagathics and magical artifice. She rides a spider-limbed walking throne, and bears a powerful eye and hand brought back from the astral by agents of the crown. She is not amused by the young copies vying for her throne. She occupies the royal residence in the countryside.

2.- Victoriana Le Fay (Seconda): corrupted by fae blood (or perhaps a darker lineage) in the formative stages, she has hair of a most unnatural red, and ram’s horns--and perhaps a devil’s tail. She occupies an abandon priory (surrounded by savage, living topiaries) from which she stages elaborate, drug-fueled orgies. She has little interest in controlling more than her dissipated followers, but she will not bow to a copy of herself.

3 - Victory (Tertia): an attractive woman in her twenties, she commands in the fog-choked, and morlock-haunted, capital of Lugdun. She personally (and recklessly) leads bands to rescue survivors and bring them to the hermetically sealed shelters, and also to retrieve supplies from roof-top airship drops. She is seldom far from her fashionable gasmask (the only defense against the poison, mutagenic fog) and her wonderbuss.

4 - Vee (Quarta) macrocephalic, and bodily atrophied, this clone was damaged in the war, and scheduled for culling, but was rescued by a cult of mutated, and mentally damaged civil servants. Her vat has been enshrined at the Science Museum, and attached to an analytical engine, through which she may deliver her pronouncements and prophecies through binary code.

5 - The Dread Queen (Quinta) - A ghost haunting the palace, feeding off the life-force of the living. She appears the same age as living Prima, but her clone body succumbed to old age after exposure to Staarkish toxic gas. She hunts for this body, and will torture any who fall into her hands to find it, but it has already been incinerated.

6 - The Darkling Child (Sexta) - Created in desperation by thaumaturgists willing to see the empire continue at any cost, this youngest queen is a girl of around seven, walled away and warded in a secret playroom. She does not eat or sleep--she is as much of the Outer Dark, as she is royal blood. She waits, and her power grows.

Sepulchral Choirboys

photo by mathyld Δ pyramids

A sepulchral choir, or spectral chorus, is an incorporeal manifestation summoned to drive a victim to madness and perhaps suicide. The choir is an apparition of skeletons of small children, only visible to the victim (unless the choir wishes otherwise) without the use of magic. Their beautiful, and intensely unnerving, singing is likewise heard by the victim alone--in fact, it specifically relates to the them, referencing their deepest fears, and darkest secrets.

The choir visitations will come mostly at night, but might also occur in the day when the victim is alone, even for a brief period. The haunting will so distract the victim they will suffer a -2 to all attack rolls and saving throws for a period of an hour after experiencing one, unless they make a saving throw. The psychic and emotional assault causes a progressive -1 per day to Wisdom, and an inability to get restful sleep or concentrate. The end result is insanity (as the options given in the confusion spell) or suicide. The choir may be turned (though this is only temporary), or banished by a remove curse.

Only one complete copy of the ritual needed to create a sepulchral choir is known to exist. It was found in the City, scrawled on the back of a handbill and left inside a hymnal in the Our Ladies of Sorrows Church.

Sepulchral Choir
Number: 1 with 1d4+2 in the choir
AC: 0
HD: (1+2)x number of choir members
Attacks: 1 (haunting singing, see above)
Special: have typical traits of incoporeal undead