DragonStrike and Wildspace

So on Wednesday I got to watch the "instructional" video for TSR's 1993 D&D-themed board game DragonStrike.  Despite being the tutorial, it really just shows a dramatization of a DragonStrike adventure.

You can blame OUT OF CONTEXT D&D QUOTES for this.

More interestingly, I learned that the actors (as the same characters) were going to return for a Spelljammer-themed television program called Wildspace.  It was never produced, although there was a trailer:

Meanwhile, on Carcosa

Orbit Magazine #1, 1953, Illustration by Rudolf Belarski

Happy Birthday, D&D!

I've seen a couple of sources placing yesterday as Dungeons & Dragon's fortieth birthday, so we'll go with that.  I celebrated by playing D&D on Saturday; the PCs fought some Carcosan Space Aliens, and then nearly died when they found some Space Alien robots.  (Incidentally, since we're almost finished with the Carcosa dungeon, I'll likely be posting my 4e Carcosa encounters within a couple of weeks.)

Happy birthday to D&D.  I'm sure much more eloquent people than I have things to say on the subject (where's Maliszewski when you need him?), so it'll just suffice to say that role-playing games are fun, and thank you for forty years of fun.

Here are some appropriate links:

Happy 40th birthday, Dungeons & Dragons! (Yahoo!)

When Dungeons & Dragons Turns 40 (Playing at the World)

Dungeons and Dragons Turns 40: 10 Awesome D&D Computer Games (PC Magazine)

Dungeons & Dragons turns 40 (USA Today)

All I needed to know about life I learned from “Dungeons & Dragons” (Salon)

Dungeons and Dragons is 40 Years Old (Daily Kos)

And finally, Out of Context D&D Quotes (Tumblr)

Lich Jesus

I usually find this sort of thing done to death, but I happened across an article that I think did the concept justice (despite a lot of silliness in the article).

There's a persistent joke going around that Jesus Christ is a lich because he was a potent spellcaster who returned from the dead under his own power within 1d10 days of his death.  I always find this a little annoying as it ignores the fact that Christ's deity revives him from the dead (clearly the DM playing favorites), or depending on your interpretation, that Jesus was a divine avatar and so never actually rose from the dead (if Jehovah or whomever loses one avatar, he just...sends another avatar).

At any rate, this blog post from Compromise and Conceit breathes a little life into the Jesus-as-lich concept by framing the various religious conflicts of the first millennium in the context of this fact.  The Jewish clerical establishment may or may not think Jesus is a rabble-rouser, but more importantly, they understand that he is slowly-but-surely gathering the components to build a phylactery and must be stopped.  (The Roman government is apparently unaware of the threat, although the Jewish clerics manage to get them to act.  Sadly, it's too late.)

(This also neatly utilizes the underused clerical lich concept, and totally paves the way for Jack Shear's lich popes.)

He goes on to explain a Vatican conspiracy hiding the Christ-phylactery (or the Christ demilich, by now), among other things (including early tensions between Jewish magic-users and a barbarian Muhammad).

Ultimately, this seems like it would be excellent background for some manner of early modern, Lamentations of the Flame Princess-style campaigning.  (Or you could even set your game earlier chronologically, if you want to dust off your copy of Testament that you clearly totally have in your collection.)

Go ahead and check out that Jesus-as-clerical-lich article and then craft some gonzo occult conspiracy D&D campaign.

Ask Chaaths-Neb, the Eternal Pharaoh

What's the deal with space aliens? — Casey Garske

WHAT IS THIS FOOLISH MORTAL, WHO WISHES TO LEARN THE SECRETS OF THE OUTLANDERS?  HEAR A TALE OF PATHETIC WRETCHES TOO WEAK TO SURVIVE ON ANY WORLD: FOR UNTOLD MILLENNIA, THE INVADERS FROM THE SKY HAVE COME TO CARCOSA TO PILLAGE ITS BOUNTY.  THEIR BULBOUS HEADS LACK THE SECRETS OF SORCERY OR THE CAPACITY FOR PSIONICS.  THEIR TECHNOLOGY CANNOT PENETRATE THE PSYCHIC BARRIERS I HAVE ERECTED AROUND MYSELF.  THEY MINE, THEY EXPERIMENT, BUT THEY ARE CHILDREN BEFORE THE MIGHT OF THE MUMMIES OF THE RADIOACTIVE DESERT OR OF THE OLD ONES THAT SLUMBER WITHIN CARCOSA.  THE WILL AND WISDOM OF NYARLATHOTEP WILL FORCE THE BULBOUS-HEADED SKY-MEN TO FLEE FROM SAVAGE CARCOSA.  SURELY, THE DOOM OF FALLING STARS WILL SCOUR THEIR GREY PLAGUE FROM THIS LAND.

THEY ARE DOOMED TO EXTINCTION, JUST AS THE SERPENT MEN BEFORE THEM.

****************************************

Dear C-N,

I'm having some problems with my coworkers. We run a cleaning and home repair service and we were hired to clean up this old abandoned structure. We kicked out the squatters, patched up some electrical problems, scrubbed up some slime, nothing out of the ordinary. It's taking time, but we're getting the job done. Then some people came over and everybody slowed down. This one guy, real cold and stiff sort, tried to slip out while no one was paying attention. Two of my crew decided to lie down on the job rather than help clear out the room. Personally, I don't think it's appropriate or professional for the team leader to "take a dirt nap" with the only woman on the team. And plus, the one chain smoker in the group decided to step out into the hall, light one up, and broke this old jar with some nasty fluid inside. It made a huge mess all over the hall. I've been with most of these guys since we were in the military and I'd trust them with my life, but I just don't know what to do anymore.

Scaled and Frustrated in Carcosa

YOU ARE A DICK.

Better Than Any Man, UA edition Part 3 and 4: Bring Out Your Dead

We ended our brief foray into early modern Unknown Armies this past Friday.  No more conversions, as the PCs didn't encounter anything noteworthy.

In Part 3 of our Better Than Any Man game, the PCs stumbled into the town of Thüngen — which Mr. Raggi placed under the control of a capricious group of bandits.  After a couple of desperate combats, the PCs fled Thüngen a little more battered and with their Epideromancer friend unconscious.

They flee the town, ignoring the burning homestead in the distance, and instead go in the complete opposite direction of Karlstadt and Würzburg, hoping to completely avoid the madness of this region and the advancing Swedish Army.  They come to a small pond and run into a fleeing woman, apparently running from the witch trials in Würzburg.  She joins them, and both she and Mannfried attempt to treat the fallen wizard's wounds.

They both fail.  Spectacularly.  The epideromancer Goffhilf catches fever and dysentery and dies within a couple of days.

Tragic.

The group continues to trek through the woods for a couple days, making a 90° at some menacing-looking earthen mounds, and stops as the wizard Goffhilf breathes his last.  They bury him, bed for the night, and awaken to find that they've been sleeping very near a plague-ridden corpse.

Within a day or so, they stumble back to Eger, and the PCs are whisked back to their home time, no doubt leaving a very confused, frightened, and hungry woman outside the town gates.

All told, the final session resulted in four deaths — one from fever and dysentery, and three more within a few days as several characters die of the plague.  One joins a nunnery, and the other continues his mercenary career, now 10,000 ducats richer.

At final count, out of a total of eight characters, six died — probably among my most deadly non-TPK games ever.

ADVICE FROM CHAATHS-NEB

BEHOLD THE ETERNAL PHARAOH, CHAATHS-NEB

So I've been running two 4e groups through the first level of my Carcosa megadungeon in preparation for finalizing it and running it on Google+ (probably in Labyrinth Lord), and one of the adventuring parties encountered a bombastic mummy brain called Chaaths-Neb.

Despite the fact that they killed him, he lives on eternally — because I think he's going to start an advice column:

IMPUDENT MORTALS, BOW BEFORE THE MIGHT AND COLLECTED WISDOM OF CHAATHS-NEB, THE ETERNAL PHARAOH OF THE RADIOACTIVE DESERT.  THE HERALD OF NYARLATHOTEP AND THE OMNISCIENT SEER OF FALLEN STARS AND BARREN WASTES CALLS UPON MILLENNIA OF FORBIDDEN WISDOM AND LORE.  BRING YOUR PATHETIC QUERIES BEFORE THE MIGHT OF THE ETERNAL PHARAOH, AND PERHAPS HE SHALL MERCIFULLY GIFT YOU WITH SOME OF HIS BOUNDLESS KNOWLEDGE.

(If you ask for advice in the comments, Chaaths-Neb will respond over time.  If I get enough of a response, this might become a regular feature.  Feel free to submit your queries in "Dear Abbey" fashion, signed with a descriptive anonymous tag.)