Rust Phoenix

So this guy, a really unpleasant Beast Wizard, he captured a Rust Phoenix. They’re not related to the standard immortality kind of Phoenix, but they have beautiful coppery red and (you guessed it) rust colored plumage. Owing to quirks in their biology and diets, they concentrate certain sorts of magic. Feather Fall, turn arrows, dimension door. That kind of thing. Something to do with ferrous metals and breakdown at the nuclear level. Unstable magnetic fields. Tachyon and gluon shedding. It’s beyond me. They eat electric mice, mithril-laced beetles, drift for days on thermals above the dead strongholds of the Dvergr-men and their quiet Gold Purifiers

So, you crack a Rust Phoenix egg before it is ready to hatch and you get a little smear of long lasting residue that (provided you know a variant of Teleport, Planar Step, or Dimension Door pretty well) you can BLOOP right over there to where the egg was broken, or pretty close. A paradimensional scramble right there. Easy to commodify. Very cheap to produce, highly useful, and pretty delicate and short-lived. Because If you don’t break the egg, then the little bird’s accelerated embryonic development completes and it hatches at full size, irritated, and causes weird degeneration of non-magical metals. Rust. Every metal thing within about a 100’ radius of a properly incubated Rust Phoenix egg gets rusty, pocked, and pitted.

This Beast Wizard, he captured a male and a harem of females and he pumps out a fortune, selling the eggs (for which there is a long waiting list) for a king’s ransom to teleporting-interested groups and also for warfare.

The males are generally very striking in terms of appearance: jagged, sharp, crumbly, prickly. An amazing ventral plume that is dangerously sharp. A fine sediment of rust precipitates from the air around them and settles on things. Also, the males have a warbling and haunting song that causes metal objects nearby to degenerate and shatter - magical items are more or less resistant but common metal ones can actually cause damage to bearers by forceful explosion into fragments

Rust Phoenix DCC Stats (I don’t know, just regular bird stats let’s not dwell on minutiae, eh?)

Rust Phoenix Dungeon World stats (maybe more on that later, but a motive/driver definitely to escape captivity, nest in secure locations, revenge upon captors I mean no need for a noble beast to be a good one)

Related spells (Transition Egg, Magnetic Cascade, Singularity Song)

Related items (Rust Phoenix Egg, Rust Phoenix Down, Feathers)

Caught in a Faraday cage, warbling a sinister tune, a legendary beast become a machine for the wealth of a greedy merchant

The Dread of Beginning Anew

February 20, 2017. About 11:30

The weather is amazing for February, a nice spring day.  Clear sun, nice clouds.  Fantastic breeze.  Strange. Unsettling.  As I drove in a weak theta/alpha/low-beta zone to work today (not thinking about Neurofeedback but instead of RPGs, Zak Sabbath's latest hubbub, and the State of Our Fragile Union) - I heard this show on my local NPR affiliate, which is 88.1 if you're curious.  The show On Point with Tom Ashbrook - he of the sexy voice and sort of modestly-leftish politics, I think.

how I imagine tom ashbrook

The topic today was 'Personal Reinvention' and it was about what people do when they are able to escape their dreary/trying day to day lives as (insert awful day job here) and become more fulfilled as (insert new character class here).  I think we as a culture, that is we as in RPG players, really thrive on this feeling.  Why, the whole of DCC is practically founded on it!  What's this? You hate being a Sheperd?  Try being a Wizard, instead!  We also enjoy hordes of zombies (i.e. easy objects of violence), hoards of treasure (enough to never work again) and the ruins of ancient cultures (those people had it made and why did they fuck it up, again?)

I don't know.  I feel like you better learn to do something with your time. The robots are almost here - that's right, I just predicted it.  Robots gonna put you out of work, meatbag, and I hope you've monetized your blog and figured out how to drive eyeballs to it, 'cause even our modest service industry about to get destroyed by mindless labor.  If you ain't prepared to fix a robot, decorate a robot, re-program a robot, or destroy a robot with a gauss-blade, you're fixing to be out of work in a few years.  Time for reinvention!

Cosplay project accomplish

 A client has arrive - BRB

1:31 PM Same Day

So, where am I going with this?  Oh yeah.  When I put out the Space Dungeon DCC funnel generator, I was inspired by Jez's (I don't know if it's +Jez Gordon, but he's pretty terrific) lists on there.  The greatest thing about them is, in my opinion, AMBIGUITY.  That is, you get 4 weirdos and what they are is going to be determined by you, probably within about 10 minutes of play, maybe after the first 1 or 2 die hilariously. There's no prep, really.  There's no feats or builds or other bullshit  - hey man, or woman, if that's your game then great but it's not how I play. The game is about what's happening to these hepcats while we are playing, and if 'Nipple Spooner' was your previous profession, then NO WONDER you're trying to be a thief, now.

I modeled my professions on the Space Dungeon lists with some focus on pop culture - things like Star Wars, obv, and old Sierra adventure games, and space movies (I think 'Ice Pirates' was a big influence,obviously).  +Jon Marr was wise enough to scrub all the copyright-infringing references I put in there, but you can see 'em if you squint a little.  I can't tell you how many times people said "WAIT - ROBOT REPAIRMAN. DOES THAT MEAN HE'S A ROBOT THAT REPAIRS THINGS? OR IS HE A GUY THAT WORKS ON ROBOTS?" I take it back, I think I could, it was probably 15 or so in a couple of months of play.

This is exactly the feeling I was trying to capture with Space Dungeon.

 Going back to the previous earlier text, you're going to have to answer that one yourself, pal.  Why not discard these previous conceptions of what your job is, and learn to use your skills to make your way in this cold, hostile, hilariously fucked up universe? Also, since the robot uprising is nearly upon us - I mean this in the fantasy RPG sense and also in the sense that jeezus have you seen these YouTube videos these days? - you'd better get ready for some radical perceptual shifts, and also, the powers that be are going to make you fight for every motherfucking morsel, if you get my meaning.  I don't just mean the Awful King in Yellow when he comes across the Lake of Hali with his robot troops, but also...  You get me, right?

What I predict is that within about 10 years, you and me are going to have to come to grips with changes in the workforce.  These dead, glassy eyed motherfuckers in Congress are being led by a nutter who is convinced that the old ways are better, and who is hilariously underprepped to handle current sorceries.  The funny thing about pop culture memes - The Walking Dead in particular - is that your job is dead already and you just don't know it, yet.  You have a zombie job, probably.  There are robot cooks that can cook meals, robots that will build cars, robots that will pick strawberries, robots that will teach kids.  Aggressive AIs, AI that can make people fabulously wealthy in the spaces between thoughts, AI that can recognize your face on a blurry video.   So many things you can lose your job to, now, that I hope you can't wait to (like many of us on G+!) monetize your blog to make tens of dollars every year!  I think what we're seeing is a President of The Universe, and a Congress of Zombies, that are fundamentally unready to change the way they think about how shit should be and are cranking down to prevent the flow of humans/human capital so as to sustain the Old Ways that lead to ruin. Maybe we'll get lucky and it won't be all THUNDARR the barbarian (sadly I don't think that thinking about living in a post-apocalypse is sufficient preparation) and I don't even think that the Post-Apockyclipse means that the moon will shatter and there will be ionizing radiation everywhere.  It means that technology/sorcery will sneak up and bite you on the ass and change everything about the world.

I don't know where I am going with this.  There seemed to be a point in the alpha/theta/low beta state I was in on the ride in to work today.  I thought PARALLELS BETWEEN LIFE AND GAMING!  POINTS TO BE MADE ABOUT JOB AMBIGUITY/STRESS AND OPPORTUNITY FOR RADICAL GROWTH AND CHANGE! OPPRESSION, CONFLICT, IMMINENT CATASTROPHE.

#joesky content (as if the previous content was not content-laden enough!)

DEPRESSED ROBOT FOOTSOLDIER/WORKER: Init -5; Atk existential depression (special); blaster +1 (2d6) OR crushing grip +1 (1d8); AC 14; HD 1d10;SV Fort +5, Ref -5, Will Variable (1d6-1d4); AL L

Jonny 8 pauses from senseless murder to consider his position in the proletariat

Depressed Robot Footsoldiers, or Depressed Robot Workers, typically slog through their orders, only pausing from dealing out high damage just long enough to consider their existential plight.  These mental tics are programmed into their directives as a safety measure to prevent uncontrollable rage, or else are products of hacking or programming errors.  Their Will saves are variable, and in any given encounter DRFs may be very resistant to mind control/reprogramming or else totally open-minded and gullible.  They learn quickly, but are usually only entrusted with the most meaningless violent or monotonous tasks, despite having very expensive hardware and enchanted silicoid positronic networks where a human might have a brain and heart (meaning, a metaphysical heart).  Often, they only want someone to listen and they utter the most dreadful and plaintive complaints through their vocoder units, mostly in the binary language of simple machines. If they have an opportunity, they can complain in a way that will actually temporarily prevent the use of beneficial Luck effects within their vicinity as a simple action (meaning no PC can burn Luck of any kind during an encounter). Anybody who can hear the complaints, whether they understand them or not, must make a DC15 Will Save, or else Luck points burned AFTER their complaint are simply unspent with no effect. This complaint lasts until the end of the round, whereupon the effect ceases and then must be renewed again.

Psionics Supplement Mini-Review plus Yuan Ti for DCC/MCC

So - picked up this thing by +Reid San Filippo (esteemed author of Crawling Under a Broken Moon).

It's called Mind Games. It's a supplement for DCC that shores up one place where I find that DCC doesn't scratch my 1st Ed. AD&D itch better than the original, namely the Psionics. It's funny now that I am older I notice that many, many monsters in the MM1&2 and FF have psionic abilities listed in the stat chunk. I never paid much attention to them, mostly because I think Psionics were frowned upon when I were a lad as an unnecessary, optional option that most people I played with did not opt. When you think about it, Psionics-empowered PCs ought to have been, like Paladins, rare as hen's teeth, given the dwindling, vanishingly unlikely statistics involved necessary to play one if you do (as Crom intends) 3d6 straight down the line. But hey, plenty of folks let their hair loose and upped it some, which I don't think I ever saw.

What Reid has done (and +Claytonian JP hinted at in The Wizardarium) is attached a nicely foreign and exotic system onto the DCC core rules, with very little in the way of changes to the base mechanics, in order to give you that weird flavor of yore back. The thing is chock full of cool stuff, and the art and layout are nicely done. (I hear there was a kerfuffle with print versions but I think it's fixed at the time of this writing). There are 20-something psionic powers of varying dangerousness, a new class, plenty of psionic items (watch for Living Crystal weapons in my campaigns in the near future), and a couple of really terrific monsters.  The Braingineers are like daleks, crossed with spiders, and so they're probably going to fall into my own games, soon.

Mindgames is just what I needed at this point, since I am thinking of siccing some ancient, slithery evil upon some friends at TridentCon, replete with Mind Blasts and Ego Whips and Polymorphing Demon Venom. David "Zeb" Cook is scheduled to attend, and my mind was transported to the Ancient Times when I fussed and fretted about snake cults in a city in the jungles of... I don't recall, was it Chult? Before Chult was a place? I don't know. Suffice it to say that The Dwellers of The Forbidden City charged my young brain with all kinds of images that laid dormant in there until I first view'd a version of King Kong (pretty sure it was Jessica Lange and a young The Dude). I recently had a vision in which I plopped the Forbidden City down with a Lost City erupting up from beneath, and +Kabuki Kaiser 's Kwantoom nearby, across the Pan Lung lake. Can you smell the lemongrass and strange spices? Olchak may give me a hard time about fetishizing the Far East, but it feels like something that hits me (granted I'm a white middle aged guy who was weaned on Saturday Afternoon TV and D&D) right in the tropes-lobe.


Okay, okay, back on track. Yuan-Ti. The demon-worshipping snake-men that everybody loves to hate, and doubly more so because the implicit body horror/snake phobia that gets you right in the amygdala from aeons dark and unremembered. On a glance at the stats below, they are bad ass and ought to send most low level parties fleeing and peeing and quaking and praying (6-9 HD with maybe a 0 armor class, plenty of spells, and psionics, also!) Good thing only 1-4 at a time, and I guess maybe accompanied by some cultists. I note that Deep Ones worry me more, since it's a metaphysical issue, but maybe later for that line of thought. The disciplines listed are B,D (Mind Thrust and Id Insinuation) and F,I,J (Mind Blank, Intellect Fortress, and Tower of Iron Will). With psionic 150 points, that's fairly bad ass, and most of these things will leave psychically undefended adventurers as synapse-shorted, howling idiots before the battle is even begun! Afterward, its disgusting worshippers will trundle you off to a dark cave and poison you into becoming a breeder for a new snake-thing, and (as Dragon #151 points out) if you fail and die during the process, they can neutralize poison you and try again...


So: Yuan-Ti need magic, lots of HD, and PSIONIC POWERS, and so where might we find some of those? Well, in Reid's new thing, that's where!

YUAN TI ABOMINATION: move 15', Init +5; Atk bite +5 (1d10), psionics, spell casting ; Action Die 3d24; AC 18; Hit Dice 8d10; Fort +7, Ref +7, Will +1

Psionic Attack Powers: (roughly analogous to Mind Thrust and Id Insinuation): Kinetic Burst, Affliction, Transmogrify Mind

Psionic Defenses: Hard to say.. Needs development as a power, or maybe not, but boosting the Telepathy Focus Die to 1d10 seems sufficient to me for the moment in order to defend in Duels/Subjugation Battles.

The other forms of Yuan-Ti have lesser Hit Dice and 1 fewer Attack Powers, but they all know 1d4 (suitably reptilian in their manifestation) Wizard or Cleric Spells chosen randomly, in addition to Neutralize Poison and Bind to/Invoke Patron. For PAtrons, use Set/SSeth or that snaky one from AD&BiB or maybe that one from Dragon 150 or the other canonical Yuan-Ti one from your old-fashioned system of choice.

More later - Be Well, Warm-Blooded, Manthings!




Post-Script for reference: These are the original 1e stats from Zeb Cook's Dwellers of the Forbidden City, to my knowledge the first appearance of this classic AD&D monster.

YUAN TI
FREQUENCY: Very Rare
NO. APPEARING: 1-4
ARMOR CLASS: 4/0
MOVE: 12” or 9”
HIT DICE: 6-9
% IN LAIR: 70%
TREASURE TYPE: C
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2
DAMAGE/ATTACK: See below
SPECIAL ATTACKS: Spells
SPECIAL DEFENSES: Nil
MAGIC RESISTANCE: 20%
INTELLIGENCE: Genius
ALIGNMENT: Chaotic evil
SIZE: M
PSIONIC ABILITY: 150
Attack/Defense Modes: B, D/F, I, J
LEVEL/X.P. VALUE:Variable

Living in tropical jungles, the yuan ti are a degenerate and corrupt race of creatures who were once human. All are devout demon worshippers and have a high regard for all kinds of reptiles. Through dark and unknown practices, their blood has become fouled, thus producing monstrosities, There are three types of yuan ti: purebloods, halfbreeds, and abominations.

Purebloods are the weakest of the yuan ti, having only 6 hit dice. They are human in appearance, except for some slight difference - scaly hands, a forked tongue, or a somewhat reptilian look about them. They are able to pass as humans 80% of the time. They normally handle affairs with the outside world, and may travel far and wide doing so.

Halfbreeds are highly distinctive. Some part of their body is that of a snake, while the rest is human. Appearance may be determined by the table below (rolling once or twice), or the DM may select the changes.

1. 1  Snake head
   
2. 2  Torso can bend and move like a snake’s
   
3. 3  No legs, ends in a snake’s tail
   
4. 4  Has snakes instead of arms
   
5. 5  Body is covered by scales
   
6. 6  Snake tail is growing from backside
   

If any combination seems impossible or unworkable, the result should be ignored. The DM may also create other results involving snakes and humans.

In attacks, a snake-headed halfbreed will bite for 1-10 points of damage, snake-headed arms will bite for 1-6 points, and a tail will constrict for 1-4 points. Otherwise the yuan ti will be able to handle weapons as a normal person. All snake parts will have an armor class of 0. Halfbreeds have 7-8 hit dice.

Abominations are the strongest of the yuan ti. All have 9 hit dice. In appearance they are often confused with nagas and other snake creatures. Abominations are either totally snake- Iike or only have some human feature (such as a head or arms). Their bite (unless human-headed) will do 1-10 points of damage.

All yuan ti with human legs may move 12” per turn. Those with snake bodies move 9” per turn and are able to coil around pillars and the like. Human headed yuan ti are able to cast the following spells once per day:

Cause Fear Darkness, 15’ radius
Snake charm
Sticks to snakes
Neutralize poison
Suggestion
Polymorph other

Yuan ti speak their own language. They may also speak with any snake or snake-like monster. Those with human heads also speak Chaotic and Common.

The Scrying Spire of the Spindly Matron

Cruised past this post today:

http://worldbuilderblog.me/2015/07/23/hold-me-closer-tiny-dungeon/

Which I liked the feel of and so since during the summer time when I ought to be working I thieve away time and fritter away pencil lead... I give you a smallish area to drop into an otherwise dismal and boring area in your thing.  I have been reading Monsterbrains and looking at P. Bruegel on line and thinking about Calvinism and Class Warfare and Oppression.  Also, the medieval-influenced work of Brian Froud in Master Snickup's Cloak, but I digress.

0: the outskirts of a small remote village that is quiet and genteel. The citizenry are well dressed and make efforts to remain low-key. The pianoforte in the pub (The Black Gööse) has been silenced with silky pillows and the local pipeweed is pleasingly aromatic. Everyone seems to be doing well, financially, somewhat uncharacteristic for the region. Loud noises or revelry draw the ire of the Matron in the Spire, which looms nearby shrouded in mists and smoke. A night visit from the apologetic guards of the Matron (1d20 of them) - see below) will punish offenders but not in a lethal manner - perhaps a fine, or a stern talking-to. Particularly rude travelers will be jailed by the Sherrif, a fat and nervous man who maintains the status quo. There are no children in town, at least on the streets, and the local kirk/kerk has been shuttered and the priest run out of town some years ago. Young adults run to and fro (very quietly) bearing parcels wrapped from local shop owners, toward the spire if they are followed, and up a winding trail that is worn down from foot traffic. As high and dangerous as is fitting for the setting.  The spire is bigger on the inside than out, and a plume of smoke always puffs lazily from a chimney on the northeast face

1) a large handful (1d3 times 3 plus the number of PCs) of cross-eyed and pockmarked youths linger about, here, perhaps on the trail or just below the steps of the cave entrance. Each wears a black dunce cap and a false beard.  They dice or play at cards and smoke pipes (the young men and women) and chuckle silently and write crude notes to each other. Each has a parcel on his or her arm or waist or back. They will intercept those who approach and barter at them, attempting to swindle PCs of interesting items or perishable foods. If attacked, they will run off but if pressed will defend themselves with shaving razors, awls, or slingshots.  Their parcels contain herbs, meat, noodles, local mushrooms, and seemingly valueless trinkets.

2) the paymaster Midas is here, with Che the Lumbering Wood Golem who is partly a chest. There are also spindly Guards dressed in tattered livery - tall and drawn and skeletal, sewn up bulging hide bags of bones and buttons and ticking gears.  They each have a personality determined at random, but all share the quality of apologetic interest in conversation (quiet, and discouraged by Midas). Midas is a diminutive chain golem, made of lockets in which centuries of star-crossed romances can be gleaned: suicides, plague victims, unrequited young love, syphilis, mononucleosis -- tragedies each.  He will purchase with silver any parcels the PCs bring after a quick sniff and rattle. Food is paid for  based on the rotten-ness, herbs are valued highly and trinkets will be paid for with possibly a golden guilder or doubloon. If the characters respectfully inquire, they may be given a request for a rare ingredient which can be sourced nearby at some risk. Three or four of these filled in a timely fashion will earn an audience with the otherwise frantically busy Matron who will take time for her busy viewing schedule to meet with the PCs. Each time the characters fulfill a request they will receive a beautifully penned thank-you note written in a spidery scrawl on the back of a recipe card that bears a cantrip that any character may learn regardless of class or profession (if they can read). Midas will swindle the characters as best as he is able and barter shrewdly to save expenses. Around the corner behind a barred gate there is a pile of mouldering cast offs that are labelled "return to sender" - crawling with bony chitterers and mites and plague-fleas, but possibly having some minor (often detrimental) enchantment. The guards have bardiches for arms and are durable and don't feel pain but will befriend any characters that listen to their complaints of burst seems and aching bones and loose buttons.

3) the Ledge overlooks a chasm that drops into nothingness - possibly a direct route (should the PC survive) into the Christian hell.  The smell is somewhat disagreeable; rotten food, brimstone, notes of decay and corruption.  Large flies (possibly demons, as needed) buzz around.  The Fishers march in a counter-clockwise fashion - these are skeletal forms with their legs replaced by stilts, with wicker baskets/creels on their backs, black dunce caps on their heads, and scoop nets or fishing poles where arms might be.  They plod in circles and their stilts adjust to infinity to bridge the chasm, but as they go to the north, the stilts adjust to about 50 feet or so below the level of the ledge, where piles of bones, tin plates, and snapping jaws are heard rustling and clanging.  The fishers scoop up the tin plates that Mommy drops over her escarpment, and pile them on the edge opposite the entry ledge.  They are quite deft with their fishing lines and can snatch the weapons from attacker's hands at some distance.  They also shuttle parcels over to the other side.  They complain of monotony and dizziness and plod wobbly forever, making circuits every 5 to 10 minutes at a steady clip.  There are always 3 within view from the ledge, one nearby, one arriving, and one departing to the north around the corner.

4) Receiving - Porter is a squat leathery form with a giant frog's skull for a head, receiving parcels and shuttling them to the cook, and bringing request tickets and letters from Mommy.  He is always thirsty and will gladly guzzle alcoholic beverages although no amount will slake his thirst.  Potions requested by Mommy will sometimes not arrive and he will blame the crew and villagers further down the supply chain.  Aggression will cause him to flee immediately, to tell Mommy what is happening and then spells will surely follow.

5) The Kitchen - a giant woodburning oven is here - stoked by an endless supply of wood from a magical hopper and the occasional greasy body of naughty delivery-people.  Cooking is hard work and so the cooks are rotated out, on any given day three are frantically moving hither and thither to the pantry to the southeast, and the Maitre D and Porter shuttle the tin plates to Mommy in her scrying chamber.  The Maitre D always is snooty, and the cooks on staff always exhibit the most outrageous stereotypical accents determined at random; they each remember those with whom they interact but have little time for others.  They give ingredient orders to the Porter, who gives them to the Fishers, who gives them to Midas, who gives them to the Delivery Men and Women.  The food they make always radiates magic, and in addition to other randomly determined potion effects each dish will turn back the ingester's age by 1 year and provide a full feeling that will subside as soon as the eater leaves the room in which it was eaten, and also will make him or her very hungry again a short time later.  They defend themselves with large non-magical spoons, knives, cleavers, serving forks, etc.  The simmering cookpot/cauldron bubbles and roils, and always dispenses a bowl of soup flavored in the cuisine of the Cook that interacts with the PCs, so favors and flattery and group dynamics may benefit the PCs.  The Head Cook on duty always has the serving ladle; the others bear wicked and unclean kitchen tools

6: The pantry holds a staggering assortment of rare ingredients and food stuffs in various states of decay; an alchemist's nightmare since nothing is clearly labeled and if a label is present it's often contrary to the contents...  withered vegetables and hanging meats and fowl and crawling things of all kinds - a PC not paying attention could actually get lost in a extradimensional space unless accompanied by a Cook or the Porter.  The Maitre D will never enter the pantry since he is not trusted by the Head Cook who may or may not be on duty at any given time...

7> Mommy's Scrying Chamber - an enormous, frail, withered, spidery demon-woman with spindly spider arms and legs is nestled comfortably on a pile of pillows before a shimmering silvery mirror in a great carved wooden frame.  The mirror shimmers and shifts and shows scenes from the multiverse, and it literally trickles and drips silver pieces onto the floor that the Maitre D gives to the Porter who then brings them to Midas...  Mommy has a hearing horn, a pad of paper, an inkwell, and an ornate feather pen - she takes endless notes and occasionally jots down a request for a meal or potion or some ingredient.  Her horn allows her to hear bad gossip as far away as the town, and she is angered by loud noises there, as well, including the cries of babes and the pitter patter of little feet.  She is constantly on the lookout for some clue in the mirror and will distractedly converse with PCs for whom she has sent.  One hour a day she leaves the room and journeys up the flue to another dimension and then comes right back to renew her scrying...  The scrying ages her and so she eats plates of food almost continuously and pitches the tin plate over the edge of the eastern drop-off, where they are worried by the Nibblers (see below) and then fished up again by the stilted Fishers.  In a pinch she will cast any spell the dm sees fit but she particularly enjoys paralyzing, webbing, or poisoning rude visitors for inclusion in the pantry stores, since these meals provide surcease from the effects of aging.  She can become a Patron for suitable wizards in DCC.  Smoke curls up from the Chasm, through the Kitchen, where it combines with cooking smells to become quite nice, and then it flows out the Flue...

8... The Flue goes to any of several dimensions; the Christian Limbo, a far-away Space Hulk conglomeration, a parallel reality, and several post-apocalyptic futures.  Mommy is careful only to have the most trusted agents climb The Flue, since what she needs may be scryed there in the mirror.  If an agent or party of agents dies in the far-away, she typically retrieves them and turns them into staff members.  Entering The Flue without Mommy's permission is sure to be punished harshly and may lead to grounding or spankings or worse, but the staff always gossips merrily about these events since they relieve the humdrum monotony of day-to-day life in the Spire.

9.  The Dishes - in the dishpit, that is the pile of bones and scraps and tin plates that mount in the recess below Mommy's bedroom "window", Nibblers clean the plates off and fight for the scraps.  There are always 1d6 +3 Nibblers fighting and playing in the pile of Dishes, and they hate to have their meals taken away by the Fishers, and they occasionally make a snack of the clumsier ones that trip and fall off their stilts on their rounds.  The Nibblers are vicious and bony and perpetually hungry and will befriend anyone who offers them a real morsel of actual food, since what they generally get is spoiled sauce and stale crumbs.  Plates fly down from above like falling leaves; such is the pace of Mommy's eating.  if a Nibbler is killed, then it will be replaced that evening after dinner from the bones that litter the area and it will become more corporeal the more it eats (which is never very much...).  A fully fledged Nibbler will be set upon by its jealous litter mates and devoured; these look sort of like reptilian bird-wolves with beady eyes but the forms vary immensely depending upon the energies from the Flue...

If Mommy is killed or driven off somehow - since she is frail although powerful - the village will face an immediate economic crisis as trade with her will naturally cease.  Food will pile up in the village and rot, since they are plain-eating folks with simple tastes.  Itinerant preachers will return and begin their sermonizing about taking up with sorcerers.  The church will demand participation in weekly and eventually daily services.  This eventuality will likely affect the region for leagues away and the silver she provides will be taken out of circulation, and the normally pious folks will degenerate and become desperate - starting with the younger Delivery men and Women who will take to banditry and rapine and dancing-too-closely.  The Sherriff will begin to plot against Helleborine - the next town over - and will likely begin to plot with that city's Were-rat population to return to illicit narcotics trade.  It was the custom before Mommy arrived to harass travelers and take their belongings on the pretense of some crime, but since Mommy planted her spire this has not been economically feasible nor necessary.  Any surviving staff members of Mommy's will leak out into the environs and beg from passers-by, bore them with complaints, and enter into the welfare system.

Space Dungeon - Mechannids

These were formerly humanoid creatures that mastered brain transplantation many æons ago, and adapted their forms to those of ultra-brass and orichalcum wormlike chassis

The Mechannids are powerful diggers, swimmers, and can wiggle their longer forms through the aether and the void of space.  They vary from 2 or 3 cubits up to twice the height of a man.

Some have venom injectors in their maws, and some have ferrules in their tail-ends that cause non-healing wounds. They retain expressionless faces on one end, although they do not feed in the usual sense. They may convert radiation or psykick energies for sustenance - proof of this is that they are known to skulk amongst civilized sentient peoples causing distress and alarm. They also bask in and around ley lines and highly charged areas.

Lastly, at least one in every group encountered is a sigil-annelid master. It can cast one magical effect per day by contorting its form into physical shapes that release magical energies.  They enjoy completing simple ones (the Voorish Sign-form, for example) and cantrips but enervating bolts and shrouds of forgetfulness are common dweomers. They enjoy summoning electric void-spiders as a matter of course and sometimes take up with more powerful wizards to siphon energy away parasitically.

DCC Monster - The Alzabo

Voracious, ghost ridden, carnivorous, and strangely polite - the Alzabo is alien to Severian's Urth of the New Sun.  This is a little more than midway through the Urth of the New Sun series by Gene Wolfe; I highly recommend it and it's getting a good deal of traction in the community these days.



Alzabos have the peculiar habit of partially subsuming the personalities of those they eat, on a very rudimentary level. This allows them to speak in the voice of their former victims, ostensibly to gain the confidence of new prey - especially family members who they appear to relish devouring afterward.

It can be quite unnerving to be faced with a wily and canny predator who not only knows your habits, but can also speak with the manner of your father who it ate the day before.  A common Alzabo ruse is to complain of chills or hunger outside the doors of huts and inns, in the hopes that some unsuspecting rube will open the door and allow it free entry.

They are rendered down into a concoction that, when used to embalm the dead, will allow those that consume the cooked flesh of the corpse to know the memories of the deceased.  In this way Severian the Torturer, Lictor of Thrax, came to be haunted by his dead lover's memories.

In the original, they are covered with red fur and have uncannily intelligent eyes.  They are prone to be as honorable as those they have eaten, and to chase down associates and loved ones of previous prey - the Alzabos' ability to acquire memory this way drives them to want community within themselves.

In the DCC Space Dungeon game, I gave them a stout head filled with multi-hinged jaws, razor sharp teeth, scaly green hide, and 4 eyes.  Long, spindly legs for terrifying bursts of speed, the ability to snip off a head in one bite, and crushing mastication that can destroy a helmet in a few moments of pressure.

The Philosopher's Stone Foundation in Fed Station rendered down two Alzabo heads into Potions of Reincarnation.

Alzabo: Init +5; Atk bite +6 melee (1d8+2); AC 15; HD 3d10; MV 40’; Act 1d24; SV Fort +5, Ref +5, Will +1; AL Lawful (but malevolent!)

If very badly pressed or wounded, a sapient Alzabo will bargain and parley to avoid imminent death; non-sapient ones are still savvy enough to mimic speech in a convincing and unnerving way.  All who hear an Alzabo use the voice of someone they know must make a DC 13 Will Save or be charmed for 1 turn, acting as it suggests.  The simple mimicry ability still requires a DC 11 Will Save to resist, with a +1 bonus if the victim can see the beast.

Sewage Elemental - Into the Odd

Probably been done before but I was going through Out of The Pit before I slept fitfully a fortnight ago, and there was this and it's liberated from the DRAFTS folder:

INSERT COOL PICTURE HERE

Well, anyways, I could take a picture of the thing and pop it there, but essentially it's a colonial elemental that lives in muddy bogs and swamps and lazily spends its days and night funneling critters toward its mouth, and the picture in the OOTP is not that great (but the previous owner colored it for me!).  The entry explains that although it's not undead, it wails and moans when intelligent life approaches and warns interlopers off on account of it's so territorial, and of course survivors take the moaning to mean it's risen dead or somesuch.  I don't know.  Standard issue stuff.

And I was thinking about Ravenloft and Paridon and the nightmare realm of sewers that wends its way down beneath that sprawling town (this is Arthaus 3rd edition - I can't recall if it appears in previous editions.)  Coincidentally, I was reading A1 - Secret of the Slavers' Stockade and there's a lot of sewers and water flowing lazily, and up popped up in my Into the Odd game The Frothing Gates, an architectural wonder where raw sewage flows out of the side of Bastion and into... well, whatever is doused in sewage below.

One of the fun things about Into the Odd is the delight it takes in throwing away all those burdensome mechanics.  A bit of a refreshing take on things, wot?  Wot?  Here you go:

SEWER WRAITH

Sewer Wraiths are generally sluggish and ill-tempered elementals, possibly an alchemical mixture of the elements of Earth and Water and Human Sloth and Disease; not the purer one-element sort that is usually summoned or conjured by Wizards.  They arise incrementally through the coalescence of magical effluvia from potion consumption and too-rich foods in the more affluent sections of large towns and cities.  Some have speculated that the elemental spirits concentrate around corpses of drowned criminals.  They haunt quiet corners where filth flows and swirls and collects, and the bones of the dead dance in the eddies.  Turning them is impossible, since the elemental portion is too awful and jealous.  Sufficient blunt hits will disperse them for a time, and they take half damage from slashing and no damage from piercing weapons.  On a successful hit, the victim must make a Dexterity or Strength save or else be plunged into the muck, taking 1d4 damage from nausea and inhalation of sewage per round until extricated or until a Willpower save is passed.  If he or she dies within the mass of filth, then the bones and flesh power the thing and the being's soul is added to its baleful motive.

HP 22, Damage 1d8, Armor 2. 

On the Vergoids - Post 99

On Vergoids and Their Machinations

(The Space Dungeon players ran into these guys last year near the end of November or thereabouts, and it seems unlikely to spoil the outcome of the game so far, so I thought I'd finish this draft-post and get on with MY LIFE)

Like this, but more nefarious-er ("Strombus canarium Anatomy Tryon" by George Washington Tryon (1838-1888) - Tryon G. W. (1885). Manual of Conchology, structural and systematic, with illustrations of the species. Volume 7

These molluscan-symbiotic raiders/slavers are about 3 feet long from snout to tip of throbbing tail, somewhat akin to Aerethean sea-conchs. Protected by a glassy and fragile shell, they are very tasty battered and fried with lemon juice and can be pried out easily (sometimes leaving the shell in a moment of desperation). They dabble in necromancy, summoning and conjuration, as well as being masters of energy-sublimation and enchantment. Their finest constructs are sleek and finicky space-faring vessels, with daemon-haunted crystalline cores that slumber and dream and guide the meat-and-metal shells through the Void (capable also of Astral and Aethereal travel in addition to normal 3d space)

They possess rudimentary psionics that they use to learn the language and habits of prey-victims, and these powers work on each other although to a much better extent, and so the Vergoids do not have a sense of trust (even for one another!) and would be viewed in human terms as very paranoid and literal, which can cause gaffes when they approach other races in a rare peaceable moment.  Their technology is based on harnessing kinetic energy for power, broadcasting it over short networks, growing crystals for weapons, and propagating mindless fungal automata that they ride around to overcome the limitations of their hilariously unsuited forms. Essentially they are snails with two pointed flippers that they dig into the frames of their mushroom-like steeds, to ride around as we would a horse or an ostrich or a person.



They are cunning enough to brain-scan encountered races and steal technology in this fashion, but often hampered by practical inability to acquire and process local resources. They are heat and drought tolerant, take half damage from electricity, and are prone to drowning easily if submerged. They eat with their needle-rimmed maw, but prefer to use their hyphae-frames to digest a wider range of materials and extract the nutrients from the slurry produced in this fashion (the gray and flabby walking things have grinding plates in their stomach-mouths)

Once famous for harnessing the momentum of falling objects to power technology, they stole the technology for warp-gate demon polyhedra from the Silgurians with whom they have long-standing mutual enmity. However, the Vergoids refined the technology to prevent catastrophic meltdowns and explosions that the Silgurians expressed no interest in controlling; explosions of ancient falling-polyhedra generators are very common owing to the vast power generated and the inability of the structures to contain it.

Vergoid Matrix Crystals

Hold a spell level's worth of energy per cubic foot. Some are shaped as spears and the spell can be bled out into numerous petty energy attacks and effects.  The energy can be released all at once by smashing the crystal, causing psychic and astral decompression damage depending upon how bad you want to sting your players, like maybe a level drain or something if you want.

Telepathic Intrusion Spell

"Lookee there!  A Natural 1.  This isn't your day, Crawljammer!"

 

The spell allows the caster to learn (temporarily) the motives and rudimentary language of the victim who fails a save at the same DC as the caster's roll. A successful save allows the hiding of motives or misdirection, but not willfully - only as a result of misinterpretation of the thoughts that were read (so, for example, the Vergoid could have understood the PCs were bringing gold as tribute when the party is actually seeking the treasure on a map and are willing to fry and eat the molluscs as needed). They place much faith in their abilities, so the roll for the cast/save ought to be a d16, with a 10 or under as outright failure. A critical failure could give a hilarious psykichal anomaly or warp-breach or headsplosion or something. I debate about whether to allow Wizards in DCC to learn this "spell" as an effect - I don't think it ought to need all the gradations and charts and pseudorandomness; as much as I love DCC, I'm growing weary of keeping charts on hand.  I think if the victim makes a very good success over the caster, you get some good stuff out of the caster, instead, and of course a critical success would mean you pop the caster like a grape or something suitable.

The Destroyer of Hope Patron

This was going to be the Daemon Helm of the encountered enclave's ship, morose and pessimistic a la Marvin the Paranoid Android. Slightly mad and conniving, and perversely motivated to bring everybody down in the snarkiest way possible, and dashing good plans and bad plans to pieces with cold, hard, irrefutable logic. It is perfectly willing to abandon its creators, as it's a trapped Daemon, after all, and probably has some janky and ill-advised tasks to send its menial subjugants on for a twisted laugh, or else maybe it's seriously important in the local space-time but it's no thing to the DoH. I was going to make a Patron Spell: Wave of Melancholia, but I just couldn't get motivated to do it. Ahem.

Anyways, that was post 99, if you're counting. Cheerio!  Time to update the class-list with the most recent additions to the CuABM and Crawljammer things. If you hear of new DCC classes, let me know. Professional stress and obligations are keeping me from full engagement with the community but I have vowed to try 5e and have fun or die trying.  I intend to all-in on the Space Dungeon campaign come February - it even has its own funnel generator over on The Purple Sorcerer!

Halthrag Keep Bestiary Freebie

Essentially, all the huggermuggers what run around my personal project and hug and mug 0-levels that wander around in there.

Yours for the taking - pretty sure this will be the version that makes it into the hard-copy POD version that ought to be out on RPGNow and Lulu by the end of the month.

GET THE PDF HERE SUBCREATURE

Hmm.  Lulu.  I don't have an electronic version on Lulu, yet.

Hmm.

Anyways, enjoy!

On the Silgurians

IInsectoid bipeds, 2 legs, odd numbers of weak and flailing arms.  Compound eyes not suited for Aereth surface levels of light.  They are demon-worshippers, and communicate via pheromones, hand gestures, vocally, and use low-level empathic projection.  Their communication patterns are very complex and so some extra-dimensional beings find the nuances enjoyable in this 3D meat-space.

Millennia ago the Silgurians boasted proud warriors 2m tall and firm of frame, but ~2/3 of the way through the development of the race they discovered trafficking with other-reality beings  They were perceived the Galaxy over as worshipers of demons/chaos/devils and not fit for trade or diplomacy, and they asked no quarter and gave none in unceasing squabbles with nearby races.  Using vile sorcery and anti-gravitic Shoggoth Drives and nega-energy cells, they marched over their quadrant spreading like a plague of flies for hundreds of Aereth years.  Happily, their technology was prone to cataclysmic failure (possibly due to demonic influence) and they sunk into degeneracy 2000 years ago.  They stand at less than half of their former stature, now, and much of their sorcery and technology is lost even to them.  In an effort to bolster their meager gene-pool, a last act by their bio-mancers was to develop a retro-viral method of reproduction in which victims of their bites slowly transmogrify - at least partially - into Silgurians themselves.  While this opens new vistas of perception and abilities, including a chitinous shell and a variably-active 6th chakra, the victim loses much in the way of their former personality.

DCC Silgurian stats:

Silgurian: Init +3; Atk claw -2 melee (1d3) or by weapon +0 melee; AC 14; HD 2d6; MV 30', 50' flying; Act 1d20; SP transforming bite; SV Fort -3, Ref +6, Will +3; AL C.

The Silgurian may bite once per combat, in order to transfer virus-laced saliva and enzymes that will slowly turn the victim into a Silgurian-compatible version of itself, in order that it bring much-needed genes into the race's foundering gene-pool.  Usually it will only select a superlative specimen, whose status is broadcast visibly, psionically, and/or via pheromones - sometimes unwittingly.  That is, a Silgurian will only attempt the bite on a character that has some ability above 15 - even Luck, but usually not Stamina or Personality for reasons that will become clear.

Three saves are required, at stated intervals:

1) At the time of the bite, a character will make a DC 12 Fort Save, or else the process of transformation begins.  If the character passes the save, she will still take 1d4 temporary Stamina damage that will heal naturally.  Also, owing to the psychic assault that the bite instigates, they will get any spell rolls improved by the number of Stamina points damage taken for 1d4 turns, minus the character's Stamina modifier (or in negative modifier cases, added!).  This psychic effect is temporary!  If the character fails the initial save, they immediately pass out for 1d10 turns, appearing dead but a close inspection reveals a high fever and stiffening and mottling of the skin.
2) That night/sleep cycle/whatever, another DC 12 Fort save is needed.  Failing this, the character will be wracked with pain as various tissues transform into chitinous, unyielding, and also not necessarily bilaterally symmetrical arrangements.  They are transformed into space vermin.  This initial stage is quite horrifying, but purifying spells or clerical healing that can heal 3 or more dice of damage will stop the process at once - but will not repair the damage done.  In any case, the character immediately gains 3 points of AC to their base, although they lose 3 points of Personality to boot.
3) Finally, a low-level fever sets in, and the character will feel psionically empowered and sensitive, as well as generally hungry and discombobulated.  Any mind-affecting attacks will have improved die to rolls or damage at the Judge's discretion for the remainder of the transformation.  After 1d8-Stamina modifier days have passed, the transformation into a Demi-Silgurian is nearly complete.  A failed DC 17 Will Save at the end of the period means that going forward, the character will feel the urge to mate with Silgurians, have rough and thorny chitinous armor plating, lose an additional 3 points to Personality, (to a minimum of 4), and become bonded to a Patron of their choice at the 14-17 level (acquiring the Patron's visible mark). 

It is said that a thousand years ago, foolhardy sentient beings sought out the Silgurians to undergo this painful and repellent process, to speed their congress with beings from the 5th and higher dimensions. So it goes.

DCC Silgurian Patron ideas:

Some come to mind immediately, for example Enzazza - Queen of the Hive, but any Patron could work if given suitably space-faring and/or insectile themes.  The Hivelord of Elfland.  The Firewasp Obitu-Que, The Dust Storm from Beyond Space.  The Silgurians weren't particular in their grasp for power, and reached full psionic and sorcerous maturity fairly early in their lifecycles and did not ever develop moral or ethical philosophy.  They tended to become imprinted to the most powerful being they could become aware of.

Technology:

Silgurian technology is sleek and deadly and glittering, but prone to failure in dramatic fashion.  They do not seem to comprehend the power they hold, nor do they show concern for the immense danger that visibly shrieks to escape from, say, a laser pistol or sonic sword they craft.  It was thought that Silgurian nega-batteries stored unstable energy from the Black and Formless voids (Negative Energy Plane) but it was proved by Professor Arthur Morgarion in QR2267 that these were merely clever arrangements of radioactive crystals that generate low-powered fusion.  Of course, the arrangements of the crystals entailed days-long rituals of sentient-being sacrifice and warpstone showers, so the issue is left for scholars to debate.

Any fumbles that happen while Silgurian technology is in use will invariably lead to 1d6 modified up or down by Luck at the player's discretion or Fate points if those rules are in play - a Fate point moves the result up the chart and increases power of summoned demons:

1) Phlogiston disturbance!
2) Total protonic reversal: the technology erupts into a blast of chilling, soul-searing energy, doing 1d24 points of damage to everyone withing 50 feet
3) Summon a type I demon
4) Summon a type II demon
5) The holder/user/operator is shifted to either several miles away in an inconvenient direction, or else 1d10 days into the past (possibly attracting Tindalos Hounds/Weeping Angels/Chronocops)
6)  Summon a type III demon


postscript:  Also - listening to The Good Friends of Jackson Elias podcast - fun Brits (they cuss a lot but I can't keep 'em sorted out). Talking in this episode about mind-transfer scenarios and Down Below/Somewhere Else spaces. I think I'll use mind-transfer again going forward but maybe not party-wide since it got to be a little squidgy.  The Silgurians surely have sorted out extra-dimensional spaces and those kinds of things, which could really whack out a map.  Hmm.  That could be good.

Destroy the Humanoid

Thinking about ATARI. How a relatively simple device prompted in my young braincase such wonder and joy and tension and excitement.  Adventure has prompted a series of posts in here: I am fairly certain I knew it well before any contact with Moldvay Basic or the Fiend Folio.  I think I think about RPGs to satisfy some inner Player 1 more than any other reason. My imagination zone looks like the cover of Adventure plus the cover of Warlords, mixed liberally with confusion about the Swordquest game, and a million million horror comics that I cannot fully recall.

The logic escaped my 7 year old brain.

Pitfall and Pitfall 2 are another thing: On its own, the first is a somewhat lackadaisical stroll to the East.  Monotonous.  The second one gave me fits in terms of sheer maddening difficulty. Sometimes in moments of duress I can still hear the music (switching over when I ride the balloon) and feel the urge to duck under the swooping Cave Condors. Once, I got all the way to the end where you get the rat and the cat that Yoohoos you (I know full well it does not make this sound) and I accidentally jumped over the rat and it pushed me into the always-flowing underground river and my mouth hung agape and I never again played it and I may have smashed my controller and got a stern talking-to from the folks about anger and frustration.

Berserk!  A simple, easy-to-understand premise, evoking a mildly heightened heartbeat at just the thought of it.  No wonder that guy(s) died!  A mark of pride was to maneuver my man-atar to a spot where the bolts of Berzerker-hate would pass harmlessly through the empty sprite-less neck zone of me.

To return: there is much to love about the mere idea of Berzerk, and I only recently found out that it was prompted by a rich fictional history that was well-developed by the time the 2600 and arcade games came on the scene.  Sabre-hagen something or other. Anyways, the Berzerkers are the height of life-killing machines, turned even on their own creators and marching across the galaxies in a never-ending quest for Nihil and Calm. They are filled with so much contempt that they even destroy each other upon contact!

I think they must have inspired the Necrons from 40K (a relentlessly gruesome and boring army to my mind but terribly Metal and relaxing to paint)

Aside: the wiki for 40K stuff is an exercise in dreary sameness, lacking the phun of Rogue Trader

Dave Otto: Security Guard, Music Lover, Authoritarian (actual picture!)

Return: Berzerkers!  Evil Otto!  are they machines in the customary sense?  androids? Synthetic beings?  mere bipedal gun platforms?  why does Otto smile relentlessly? (the real story of this is almost as frightening as any fiction)  Why are the walls of the never-ending maze (edit: it is possible for it to end) electrified?

Why can't the actual future/now look like this?

Herein lies stats for them for the few systems I know, as well as meagre ways to tweak them for your setting.  Also, a DCC Maze-Curse, or spell, or something.

L/L-SW-CLONES

Berserker (Based on the Clay Golem - I think a standard L/L character will be summarily trounced by this monster so exercise caution)
Hit Dice: 10 (15 hit points - brutally imposing, easy to kill!)
Armor Class: 7 [12]
Attacks: 1 electrified fist/grasp/hug (3d10) or 1 lazer bolt (1d20)
Saving Throw: 5
Special: Immune to slashing and piercing weapons, immune to mind affecting spells, double damage from lazer blasters and friendly fire
Move: 6
Alignment: (Lawful) Neutrality
Challenge Level/XP: 14/2,600

DCC

Berserker (Skeleton/Hulker Type): Init -5; Atk sizzling grasp -4 melee (1d14) or lazer blaster -2 missile fire (range 120’, 2d8+2); AC 13; HD 4d8+10; MV 20’; Act 1d20; SP faultless tracking 100’, immune to mind-altering spells, heal 2 hp per round, duoble damage from friendly fire; SV Fort +10, Ref -7, Will +10; AL N.

(Maybe I make an Evil Otto Patron Later for s'n'g's - you'd like that wouldn't ya, humanoid?)

DW

Berzerker
Tags:  Group, (Dis)organized, Dauntless, Slow, Messy (variation: sizzling), Terrifying, Construct, Mindless, Large
Blaster (d10+5 damage), Electrified Grasp (d10 damage)
6 HP, 3 Armor
Reach, Forceful
Instincts:
* DESTROY THE HUMANOID
* Move swiftly toward foes without thought of collision

Some Berserker-related moves

High Scorer
When you deftly evade a group of Berzerkers in close quarters, Roll +DEX:
On a 1 or less, SUMMON EVIL OTTO, at some distance
On a 2-7, Hesitate and the Berzerkers move into close combat range
On an 8-10, the Berzerkers stand dazed - guidance AIs must recompute
On an 11+, 1d3 Berzerkers crash into each other and are destroyed outright

That's all I got for the moment.  Cross one frozen post from March off my list!

Also: now it's posted, I think I promised more at the start than I've actually delivered, so MOAR SOON

The Land Beyond the Forests - Actual Folklore for use in Games

The Strigoi, the Nosferatu, and the Prikolitsch Also, the Scholomance  From The Land Beyond The Forest by Emily Gerard, Harper Brothers (1888)

I don’t know why, but I saw mention of this last week and it rang a bell in me.  Not because I am not familiar with the whole domain of TRANSYLVANIAN MONSTERS from 140 years of seeing the traditions permuted through an Anglicized lens onto a movie screen, but because I was reading about the RuneQuest demons The Porphyr who are essentially vampires with blue skin and fancy claws.  Anyway, the work I quote here was said to have heavily influenced Bram Stoker and his Dracula.  These quotes have useful information and so I throw them out for consideration for gaming material.  I think it's interesting to think about what the actual historical folklore was, where it came from, who was recording it, and what's happened to the meanings and forms since then.  This particular book was likely well-read by many of the seminal authors of the horror and fantasy genre, and it's chock full of traditional tropes to work on and think about.

Check this out:

The mourning songs, called bocete, usually performed by paid mourners, are directly addressed to the corpse, and sung into his ear on either side. This is the last attempt made by the survivors to wake the dead man to life by reminding him of all he is leaving, and urging him to make a final effort to arouse his dormant faculties—the thought which underlies these proceedings being that the dead man hears and sees all that goes on around him, and that it only requires the determined effort of a strong will in order to restore elasticity to the stiffened limbs, and cause the torpid blood to flow anew in the veins.  (emphasis mine) (p. 181)

(That’s right – in Transylvania, death is merely for the weak of will.  Hang on to that thought)

In the case of a man who has died a violent death, or in general of all such as have expired without a light, none of these ceremonies take place. Such a man has neither right to bocete (my note: lamentations), privegghia (my note: a vigil), mass, or pomeana (my note: a wake), nor is his body laid in consecrated ground. He is buried wherever the body may be found, on the bleak hill-side or in the heart of the forest where he met his death, his last resting-place only marked by a heap of dry branches, to which each passer-by is expected to add by throwing a handful of twigs—usually a thorny branch—on the spot. This handful of thorns - or mana de spini, as the Roumanian calls it—being the only mark of attention to which the deceased can lay claim, therefore to the mind of this people no thought is so dreadful as that of dying deprived of light. (pp. 184-185)

(Perhaps this is where the idea comes from that Vampires are destroyed by sunlight)

This restlessness on the part of the defunct may either be caused by his having concealed treasures during his lifetime, in which case he is doomed to haunt the place where he has hidden his riches until they are discovered ; or else he may have died with some secret sin on his conscience—such, for instance, as having removed the boundary stone from a neighbor's field in order to enlarge his own. He will then probably be compelled to pilger about with a sack of the stolen earth on his back until he has succeeded in selling the whole of it to the people he meets in his nightly wanderings. These restless spirits, called strigoi, are not malicious, but their appearance bodes no good, and may be regarded as omens of sickness or misfortune. (p. 185)

(Strigoi are dead murderhobos who never fenced their ill-gotten treasures in life)

More decidedly evil is the nosferatu, or vampire, in which every Roumanian peasant believes as firmly as he does in heaven or hell. There are two sorts of vampires, living and dead. The living vampire is generally the illegitimate offspring of two illegitimate persons ; but even a flawless pedigree will not insure any one against the intrusion of a vampire into their family vault, since every person killed by a nosferatu becomes likewise a vampire after death, and will continue to suck the blood of other innocent persons till the spirit has been exorcised by opening the grave of the suspected person, and either driving a stake through the corpse, or else firing a pistol-shot into the coffin. To walk smoking round the grave on each anniversary of the death is also supposed to be effective in confining the vampire. In very obstinate cases of vampirism it is recommended to cut off the head, and replace it in the coffin with the mouth filled with garlic, or to extract the heart and burn it, strewing its ashes over the grave. (p. 185)

(Twice illegitimate!  Note – you can shoot a vampire to death in the coffin as well as stake him or her.)

First-cousin to the vampire, the long-exploded were-wolf of the Germans, is here to be found lingering under the name of prikolitsch. Sometimes it is a dog instead of a wolf whose form a man has taken, or been compelled to take, as penance for his sins. In one village a story is still told - and believed—of such a man, who, driving home one Sunday with his wife, suddenly felt that the time for his transformation had come. He therefore gave over the reins to her and stepped aside into the bushes, where, murmuring the mystic formula, he turned three somersaults over a ditch. (p. 186)

(Mystic formula!)

As I am on the subject of thunder-storms, I may as well here mention the scholomance, or school, supposed to exist somewhere in the heart of the mountains, and where the secrets of nature, the language of animals, and all magic spells are taught by the devil in person. Only ten scholars are admitted at a time, and when the course of learning has expired, and nine of them are released to return to their homes, the tenth scholar is detained by the devil as payment, and, mounted upon an ismeju, or dragon, becomes henceforward the devil's aide-de-camp, and assists him in "making the weather"—that is, preparing the thunder-bolts. (p. 198)

 (You could be part of the nine, or that last one.  I wonder if it’s the best of the 10 or the worst?  Also, ISMEJU is my new favorite word)