Into the Oddballs for 5e

Man, Into the Odd was/is so good. Hyper fast setup: 3d6 three times, then 1d6 for hit points. Consult the chart 'n' off you go, with some interesting and balanced (in a way) weirdos. I wish 5e could be that quick and simple.

Well, you know what? It can be!

I dont have Electric Bastionland, or ItO Remastered, or more current iterations of the thing but I do have the waaaaay back ItO , and the early one with the red cover. That is not to say you shouldn't go get those new things, but this is a remainder from the Geeplus days of ItO and has wormed around in my moth-eaten brain for some time. I haven't tried it as such, but it's sprouting now and if radical alteration of the fundamentals of games is not your thing, then probably move along now. I'm ripping it from the Red Cover version down below.

So: You roll 3d6 three times and 1d6 for starting hit points (or 4d4 if you want the median to move up a little bit at the expense of headroom). You put those where you want them. The rest of your stats are 8. Yes, 8. These are 0-level dorkusses. The background will be "Oddball Novitiate" or something like that. Don't apply racial bonuses or abilities just yet. You don't get the rest of the stuff you might otherwise get, either. Save that for after your first mini adventure. Consult the chart (I hope Chris and Paolo don't mind I screen capped it - I purposely kept the resolution pretty low). Where it says 'Arcana', for the really low powered folks, you get a totally-randomly-generated magic item, up to and including Earth-Shaking unique artifacts. ImHO a level-0 with the Hand of Vecna would be awesome, and a perfect candidate for all sorts of shenanigans. Balance and fairness be damned. You can get 1d6 times 10 gold pieces, too. As a treat. for rations and candles or whatever. Then, you get dropped full on into some precarious situation. Maybe your skyship is caught an a mountain peak and you need to get into the town below for supplies (actually happened in a ItO game I ran back in the day)

Weapons do the appropriate amount of damage and types, and firearms can do either Blunt or Radiant or Fire or whatever as you like, since they could be laser guns, too in my game.

Taaadaaaa! Fast and furious - off you go and stay in trouble, kids!

A Couple of Random Wampus Witches

Hey all y'all!

Like you, I dig Halloween and it's here. Or pretty durn close (Edit: i forgot about this until mid-November - so sorry!!). So my esteemed friend Erik (twitter handle : @daydreamtiger1 ) over at Wampus Country has forwarded to me and other Kickstarter backers of his Lumberlands project a fun little October-taster partly distilled from some previous WC posts (I dig the sucromancer and lore behind it and refuse to acknowledge whether I bumped into candy-races whilst thinking of Thrend). Amongst the other amazing things it contains, you jealous reprobate, is a "Random Witch Generator" and if you are anything like me, which is established (see above) that's just the sort of thing you need at this time of year. I was thinking about doing a "Witch March" where you plod along to the west, conflicting and conquering The Myriad Witches of Thrend, the kicker being that once they are all disposed of you find they are the only thing keeping off THE REAL BADGUY who is of course a douchebag CyberLich or sommat. Fight the patriarchy yinz. 

These days, I'm often kept awake by the screeching and to-and-froing of the witches in my county, so I don't have a great deal of processing power left in my brain to handle my witch-based needs unless I eat an unhealth-ier amount of candy than I do and my dentist has forbidden such and so I used Erik's wondrous document and my trusty dice/computer to cook up a couple of startling witches on the fly, totally at random. I could probably manage a Tablesmith thing but we'll see. You ready? I'm ready! Handfuls of dice (as you are wont) (postscript, I actually did finish the Tablesmith generator and here is 5 Wampus Witches for yinz).

post-Postscriptum: Erik conveyed to me that a goodman hath entered his works into Abulafia, wherein the entry you will need is missing because Abulafia is currently plagued by PHP issues. I wish I could help you, Dave Y.!

Again: here is the Tablesmith .tab file for yinz what have it

1. This witch is named Goody Rat. She is a witch because she consumed devil-flesh. She hates those who are outwardly upstanding, but secretly corrupt, and is known for thriving on cannibalism.She has beaklike nose and wears furs and hides. It is rumored that vomits forth worms. She can be seen riding about on transforms into (mist, dark cloud, puddle of blood, shifting sands).Her pet is superior-to-the-norm specimen (lesser undead, goblinoid), and she is weak against her own voice. She is never far from her standard weapon (dagger, spear) made of something unusual
2. This witch is named Gujah Steel. She is a witch because she died by exposure. She hates oak trees, and is known for harrying travellers on “her road”.She has crooked nose and wears dark robes. It is rumored that vomits forth insects. She can be seen riding about on saddle/howdah on the back of a giant version of a mundane animal (vole, pillbug, sow).Her pet is sentient animated object (tome, ottoman, scythe, dressing-mirror, mounted moose head), and she is weak against mundane plant (hollyberry, potato). She is never far from her creepy light source (candlestick, lantern, hand of glory)
3. This witch is named Wrack Culai. She is a witch because she foolishly made an evil bargain. She hates sunlight, and is known for punishing the sexually liberal.She has yellow skin and wears covered in dirt and moss or leaves. It is rumored that if caught out at sunrise, she turns to stone. She can be seen riding about on chariot/coach drawn by (black steeds, skinless hounds, blinded orphans).Her pet is sentient animated object (tome, ottoman, scythe, dressing-mirror, mounted moose head), and she is weak against mundane plant (hollyberry, potato). She is never far from her creepy light source (candlestick, lantern, hand of glory)
4. 
   This witch is named Sister Ghost. She is a witch because she cruelly murdered someone. She hates children, and is known for cursing infants whose mothers are impious.She has patches of feathers and wears furs and hides. It is rumored that causes flowers to wilt. She can be seen riding about on immense kitchen object (mortar & pestle, bowl, beer-stein).Her pet is floating, talking (skull, jack-o-lantern, severed dog’s head), and she is weak against particular moon-phase, holiday or unusual occurrence (coronation of a new king, etc). She is never far from her creepy light source (candlestick, lantern, hand of glory)
5. This witch is named Missus
   
   
   
   
   

   

   It is the ringing of the bell that commands you to find this show!

   
   
   
   
   
   Oakie Fitzherbert. She is a witch because she cursed the King. She hates fairies, and is known for stealing forgotten objects and punishes the former owner.She has patches of fur and wears matron’s clothing. It is rumored that has teeth, that if planted, will produce a tree whose fruit are infant goblins. She can be seen riding about on transforms into a flying creature (screech owl, bat, giant moth - human head optional).Her pet is superior-to-the-norm specimen (lesser undead, goblinoid), and she is weak against mundane plant (hollyberry, potato). She is never far from her something choppy (meat cleaver, woodsman’s hatchet)

Weird Americana HH Monographs

I am working out an effective (to me) and easy-on-the-eyes 6x9 (possibly poorly layed-out objectively and subjectively) little thing.  I call it a monograph style, but these aren't REAL PLACES, they are only little locales for use in games.

The feel and flavor is a little bit DCC, a little bit Wampus Country by my associate and pal +Erik Jensen . Something like Wind in the Willows, Bioshock, and Thundarr smooshed together.  I'm going to offer them on G+ as feeblies/freeblies as I diddle with them, and maybe if there is a good response then to gussy them up and offer them as PWYW on RPGNow.

Just as motivation for myself, and if anybody bites the hook and Pays What They Wants, then it allows me to use that as credits for buyin' other peoples' stuff.  I think it's a fair idea, on paper.

Anyway, the setting and the actual adventures are implied rather than explicit, and revealed in small bits in the descriptions of NPCs and monsters. This last one I cooked up on a slow workday is more sort of Deep Ones/Crawdads/Academia than anything else, but I forget why I made it that way.  The thing is inspired by frequent dreams of mine where I am wandering around a U.F./F.S.U. simulacrum of 20+ years gone by, fretting about missed classes and the state of my apartment... Why did I always miss class? Well, Professor, it's like I told you, some nefarious beings made me forget.  Can I get a passing grade rather than a flat F? For the record I never tried this approach after the first time I tried it because, uh, lesson learned.

I FORGET TO PUT IN THE LINK.

Dealing with Forgotten Daemons

I don't know if this is heavily protected stuff, but after somebody's posting the other day of the magnificent White Dwarf stuff for AD&D, I went on a tear and checked it out.  It's enchanting and awesome, particularly the Fiend Folio II, the gigantic listing of clever WD monsters that didn't make the cut for the original Fiend Folio.  The FF is my favorite D&D book of all time, probably more due to nostalgia than anything else, since it was the first RPG book of any kind that I ever owned.  A lot of the magic probably had to do with Russ N.'s amazing drawings (seriously, the Sons of Kyuss have damaged me in ways I cannot begin to explain not the band the monster)

This maggoty creep can find anything on the internet, or in a dungeon, or in the Palaces of Alabaster Flesh.

There is one section in there from maybe WD#45 and it's all about a bunch of whacky but sinister demons - entirely unlike the MM and the other TSR demons, generally.  Likely because they are conversions from a previously published article about RuneQuest demonology.  The more I learn of Runequest, and Questworld, the more my eye turns back to my BRP Elric and I'm interested in the other ways that RPGs might have gone if they'd been untethered from statistical analysis and wargames earlier...  Whole 'nother post, I guess.

I musta had some weird whispering coming through the warpgates, or whatever, but I tracked those RQ down, snipped 'em out, and was going to convert them to a shiny new document but it seems maybe like too much work and the illustrations are fanciful and exciting.  The first couple of pages has renderable text, so I guess you could (if you were inclined) suck the words out and make a beautiful new thing with it, but...

Edit: I withdraw this. I don't feel so great about putting the thing up even 35 years later without permission.

I particularly like the bargaining bits, and the flowchart comic for dealing with summoned demons.  The stuff is not entirely new or original, now - but it was probably pretty neat back then, and I like the variety and new/old flavours since all I usually consider are Vrocks and Malfeshnee and Rifts-type stuff and various entirely random things made with the Esoteric Creature thingamabob.  The particular fun is when you get into bonding with the Big Bads and the special powers etc.

Ichorteat Grottoe - Community Map

A simple map - I was at a staff meeting last week and bristling against paperwork and little blue squares and such.  I went out of my way to make sure the angles mostly aren't square and rectilinear.    What an ugly word.  Parallel. That's a lot of L's

I envision some Runequest-style demonologists and a cult or three for the big hopping toad idol at the top. Came back to the whole thing and inked the first layer of walls after reading some of the stuff in the unofficial Fiend Folio II that +Greg Gorgonmilk posted onto the G+ thread

Lots of traps and maybe a few secret passages.  Gateway drugs into demon-toad worship and the bodies of a few dozen innocents.  Mugwumps, doelms, and bullywugs. Flooded passages (haven't decided which they ought to be, yet)

This is the basic version but maybe I'll do up a thing like Dyson does with all the hatching.  It's soothing and a stress thing  and good for goldbricking at meetings.  Or while waiting for clients to arrive or fill out paperwork. Writing the odd dissonant hymn or dirge to a toad demon while waiting for the coffee to brew

Update:

If I had used the scanner I could have cleaned up some of the pencil lines but then I'd have had to clean the back desk off and... Well, I will work it out later.

Tcho Tchos as Player Races in Dungeon Crawl Classics

I proposed this DCC rules tweak some months ago, and it's been waiting in my "drafts" since then, another unfinished thing that weighs on me on a tiny way every time I look at the list. To prove it's entirely possible to crank bloggery out without recourse to fluff and Groupthink, here's what you get on my lunch break

I had a discussion about alternate character classes that could be used to muck over the Tolkien-y Token Hobbit/Halfling that drips from fantasy roleplaying. Frankly I understand neither it nor the elf - for some reason I'm not big on dwarves but I like 'em better than the others.  With a literally infinite number of bookmarks for "small/cute/quick/deft", why do people want one that is essentially a little human?  Dwarves have their thing and gnomes have theirs - one good thing that DCC gives halflings is the Luck thing so every party wants a token halfling to keep them alive when the chips are down.

Dave allows skaven/ratlings in his iron canyons thing

I also thought about froglings, bug-folks, Yazirians and Dralasites a la the Star Frontiers game.  Speaking of Thri-Kreen and Vrusk, they make good elf replacers. Just me.

I'd find a copy of Talislanta if I could.

Anyways - back to the original premise. Tcho Tcho!  Evil halfling cannibals!  Steeped in magic and madness and white ganglion paste!

My idea was to have the Luck burn work in a manner opposite from the Halfling's - that is, burn a Luck point and get double the amount to reduce rolls that impact the player character or party members, e.g. attacks by enemies/spell rolls. You have to have a by-the-book DM and pretty good trust and the agreement that once the roll is known you can reduce it with the burn and purchase.

I haven't drawn up a document like I did with the Deep One Hybrid - that was sort of a "whole cloth" thing and this is just twerkin'

Maybe I could throw in a "quick regeneration of Luck points with the consumption of human/demi-human flesh" mechanic but I think I just did it.  Maybe access to one bad spell every couple of levels and some way to add a greater amount of corruption associated with casting (increase the corruption threat to include successes and not-disastrous failure)

Blow guns, garrotes, sacrificial knives, poison (needs poison skills, obviously)

I even went so far as to draw a thing for this when I was thinking of it... It's around here somewhere. Will add captions and fun links for later.

Scratch off "Tcho Tcho" and add Yazirian and Dralasite and Vrusk. Me and Evan worked out a Mok already

They file their teeth down, those Tcho Tchos, for bitin'

Edit: add on (possible halfling alternates) Robear-berbils, any of the shorty races from the Fiend Folio, mephits (if you're adventurous), goblins/kobolds/redcaps/kappa/Tenku

Ewoks

Gummi bears (duh!)

I proposed a couple of anthropomorphic animals a couple of weeks ago (Otter, fox, raccoon, possum, armadillo)

I don't know, these aren't even particularly creative ideas but they beat the endless parade of Frilbo Saggville-Hagginses

Your mileage may vary, of course.

Downward! into Barrowmaze Again... ?

Coming up on the anniversary of the Scourge of the Barrowmaze campaign - a thing that lasted 6 or 7 months last year and brought me a good deal of fun times.  At that time, I was inspired by +Dave Younce 's IRON CANYONS campaign (soon to be rebooted?) - I was struck by the simple return into a relatively easy format of a game I loved.  You may say that the "Dungeon Crawl Hack and Slash" is a bit crusty - well, you oughtn't to say it but I guess you could.

But there is unlife in those bones, yet.

Witness the nextest iteration of BARROWMAZE

I hope this becomes funded - I am unable to fund it at the "Little Guys" level, and I probably can't even do it at the lowest level until maybe early next month, but it's a great setting and always ratcheted up the tension.  As much as I want a box of all those little plastic (or metal? some alien alloy?) figs, almost the entirety of my RPG'ing these days comes over the G+ pipes and the figs would be frowned upon by my wife (she still doesn't like the box of Space Marines taking up square footage in the back bedroom).  Also, my latest favoritest all-consumingest game lately is "DADDY" in which my levels are fairly low but quest opportunities abound.

If you've come here looking for DCC character classes, know full well that Barrowmaze is the ideal vehicle to slaughter a funnel full of sub-heroes, and also it's great fun to laugh as the survivors flee in terror back to Helix across the moors!  If you feel particularly cruel, you can have ghouls or bandits chase them almost the whole way, having eaten/stolen their horses and the digging crew they left to watch them.

Muwahahaha!

I released these to the G+ DCC community last year in the late spring, but 'ere you go, in the interests of making more flubaloo around Greg's awesome project.  You will find a "better than doing it on the fly" conversion of the monsters from Barrowmaze I to DCC stats.  There's also a combined Random Monster Encounters for my campaign which includes some monstrosities hell-bent on vengeance against the party, and a secretive clan of reptilian ghoul worshippers.  The entries include all kinds of opportunity to Hell to bust out in the middle of the tomb-quiet hallways, which of course degenerates into a "eat your brains" free for all.

1.  Barrowmaze I common critters with DCC stats
2.  Turbocharged BMI+BM2 random encounter tables

I had a plan to DCC statify all the Barrowmaze monsters in all the encounters throughout the text (something that +Paul Wolfe inspired me to do) but, there's an awful lot of variety and it comes to like 150 different monsters and then the baby came in August.

I also have a "mildly improved" list of awful random properties to add onto Undead Encounters, but I will hold off on that since I'm enchanting it a little stronger.

I might reboot the campaign - if you're interested, then drop me a line - or even better, just join the community on G+ and say so.  You can find the funnel generator for it at the Purple Sorcerer here (this is my opportunity to connect +Greg Gillespie and +Jon Marr who have done a bunch to get me excited in RPGs again). If you are interested in a paper version of the d200-something funnel occupations chart for the thing, to see what classes I was hoping to include into it, then that can be found here. Warning: madness abounds, there - I was inspired by Discworld, Gamma World, Ravenloft, Lovecraft, and Realms of Crawling Chaos.

The Scourge of the Barrowmaze is sort of an attempt to instill Ravenloft-style Gothic Horror and Post-Apocalyptic (think ASE) despair onto a traditional Dungeon Crawl Hack n Slash vehicle.  We never made it too far into the actual BM complex, since almost without exception the party was swamped by random groups of undead or surface-venturing parties of looters or cultists.  The community design is a pale rip-off of the Labyrinth Lord Roll20.net Barrowmaze game hosted lovingly by +Jason Paul McCartan.  His is an absolute model of what a campaign community ought to look like - frankly I don't know how he does it what with his other commitments.

I usually don't get into the crowdfunding for reasons that others may better explain, but this setting in particular has given me a lot of good times and I wish it well and Greg good luck.  Also, it would be fun to see even more hideous evil unearthed.

Some Brief Reviews of Dungeon Crawl Classics (and other) products.

I like to throw some DCC Patrons out every so often, the odd playable race, player aids.  I run a campaign that a couple of folks have played in.  It's fun.  That's what this thing is about, right?  So's I don't turn me and the ladies into paupers, I try to limit my RPG purchases to no more than 10 bucks a week...  It is vexing that there is so much high quality stuff from all corners of the DCC community.

In the interests of spreading around much love and harmony and constructive criticism, and in the hopes that one day others may do the same for me, I offer the following trio of reviews of some really amazing gaming products, shortly (after I get my act together) they will go to the product reviews of RPGNow/DriveThruRPG

My most recent purchase is a threebie (right around 10 bucks, together):

1.Crawl! fanzine #7 by Rev. Dak and the crew - in short, I love this whole run.  I can't get enough.  I only hope that my purchasing of these 'zines one at a time every so often somehow helps keep it (and the good Reverend Dak Ultimak) alive.  Criticals for traps, a nicely evil sword by a loose associate of mine, and some other good stuff.

2. CE04, The Seven Deadly Skills of Sir Amoral the Misbegotten, by Daniel Bishop, Published by Purple Duck Games.  In brief, an excellent adventure with some great hooks and cool moves to incorporate into your campaign.  I haven't ever been disappointed in any purchase I've made that has Mr. Bishop's name in it or on it - he's a quiet, guiding luminary of the DCC community.  The mysterious stone heads are worth the price of admission.

3. SC3, A Gathering of the Marked, by Jon Marr of Purple Sorcerer fame, published under the Purple Sorcerer label.  I love Marr's free works (c'mon, the Funnel Generator is a thing of beauty) and if I had a regular face to face group I would painstakingly make all the little included paper minifigs so that we could use them.  The adventure itself is clever and although I think some would object to linearity (not me), it culminates nicely with a bang.

(I note with some dismay that the first draft of this post sat in the queue quietly awaiting publication and since then I have purchased a couple other things that are almost uniformly awesome)

More later

The Treader in the Dust, now with more Dungeon Crawl Classics

I usually do projects like this in order to learn stuff, and I confess that writing this entity up was somewhat hypnotic.  Lots of Q's.  Good thing I didn't use an umlaut.  Also, InDesign has much, much juju.  Now that I have slayed it and eaten its bitter, black heart, I...  Sadly, I think that with the baby having come between then and now, I have forgotten many of the clever things I learned to put this document together.  Oh well, there's always the next project.

I offer you the Dungeon Crawl Classics patron Quachil Uttaus, an awful thing from beyond time and space that gives those who know of it extended life, a modicum of mote-y power, and a messy and dusty end.  If you don't know all this good stuff already, it's from this story by Clark Ashton Smith, which you can find over on the Eldritch Dark.

I hereby abjure you to drop it in to your DCC campaign, kill some players and NPCs with it, and let me know how it works out.

Next: more Eldrich Horrors, this time as PCs in Dungeon Crawl Classics

A Plethora of Alternate Classraces for you To Crawl through Dungeons In

So, I really dig Realms of Crawling Chaos (hereafter RoCC) for Labyrinth Lord - it was the purchase of this item that prompted me to start the DCC campaign, together with a smattering of play in Dave Younce's and Jason Paul MacCartan's games and Daniel Bishop's Christmas module from last year ("The Thing in the Chimney" - adroitly run for me and Jurgen Mayer by Josha Petronis-Akins).

Since DCC is kinda my rules-set of choice these days, and I've been poring over interesting ideas in the never-ending quest to keep the folks coming to play, I have been much pondering over the White Ape, White Ape hybrids, Voormis, and Deep One hybrid ("Sea-Folk") in RoCC.  As I have argued in other fora in the past, in DCC there's really no reason IMHO why you couldn't slap any "race" you wanted on a bunch of stats and wing the skills etc. from there (provided the class is right for you).  So, if I had a high Strength and Stamina Warrior and wanted a White Ape, then hey, call him "Gruthorn the White Ape", have his occupation be "Banana Warden" or whatever, and off you go.  Some approaches to occupations outside of the traditional medieval ones are simply outstanding, to my mind, and the core rules sort of encourage with a sly wink that characters should go with the mood that moves them.  Hey, read it how you want to.

Anyways, with this in mind, and my eye on several neat posts on the DCCRPG community on G+, here are links to a bunch of alternate classes or races that have utility and could show up in a game near you, soon.  Or not - I've noticed a good deal of puritanism so far although my circle of DCC gamers is small.

Serpent-Folk, Deep-One, and Orc

Centaur

Drunken Monk

Wild Mage

Kenku (note: several other races hidden in nearby links wink wink)

Lizardfolk

Monk

Ninja

There's even a campaign  around there somewhere where here, in which the Judge allows a motley crew of races culled from a wide variety of TSR stuff from way back.

Also, don't forget about Crawl! fanzine #6 which has a Gnome, a Ranger, a Paladin, and a Bard.

I only link these because I hate elves.  I hate them.  At least, the Tolkienish elves, except the ones from the Rankin-Bass Hobbit movie.   The Magic Candle had interesting bald, weird looking elves.  Anyways, I don't judge you elfy types.  It's all good.

If you know of more, please feel free to add a link in the comments.

Also, I just saw this which I like to think about. A method to generate non-standard races for play during the funnel.

Thus came the Mole-Man

My own race, the Deep One Hybrid

The Robot re-coalesced into demireality.

Warforged

The Samurai is lost in the aether maybe returned to us, with honor and much wisdom gleaned from the nebulous realm of non-existence

Thanks to you, sir, for your Tiefling

There's a thing called Transylvanian Adventures on RPGNow, includes a bunch of new classes.

A pretty cool Druid for you

My very own Tomb Rustler

A loose framework for the anti-halfling Tcho-Tcho Marauder! It eats all your white ganglion paste and Long Pork Short Ribs

My own list of Star Frontiers races conversions for DCC use

Mystic Bull's Tokar - shaggy maned stout hunter gatherers from THE GOD SEED AWAKENS

I saw a Weird Scientist happen the other day

A Talislantan Thrall Warrior

My own Skate Hero, zipping around and olly-ing over stuff

The works of +Daniel Bishop are rife with  new races; I think maybe it's a point of honor for him to include new ones in the things he publishes.  The Creeping Beauties of the Woods series is now in its second installment and has a Faerie Animal that is chock full of potential!  I want to play a chaotic Fox Spirit heavily corrupted by plague in memoriam to the rabid critter I killed to death with a coffee mug last year, but I digress

Crawljammer #1 has a Lizardman Mercenary and the requisite occupations

I have it on good authority that the Crawljammer! #2 has a Technomancer (it's now in my RPGNow cart)

Also, rumour has it that Crawling Under A Broken Moon  fanzine has a Technologist class, and it can be had for purchase over at THIS LINK.  Lords of Light!  Let's Ride!

Tales from the Fallen Empire is a setting book for DCC, including 6 new classes and a revision of the Wizard - on the wishlist but soon to be picked up.  It includes a Man-Ape, so it's a must-buy next paycheck for me.

Daniel Bishop posted another race on his blog which looks fun, The Zariah

My toil is unceasing, far from home, I present The Moon Dweller Psionicist

Behold the coming of The Scrappler!

A thewsy Barbarian

Age of Ruins has a Henchman set up for second-string survivors (not a full write up)

If something's not on here, it's mostly because I don't own it yet (for example in the case of the Tales of The Fallen Empire source book)

I am gratified that this list is evidently useful - spread the word to all yer friends! (also, it may need a break down and rebuild as it's getting unwieldy and may become a print thing also)

The Tomb of the Ssessarids (map doodling)

So, thanks to G+ and the hangout phenomenon, I have been lucky enough to find a semi-regular play group. Got me really thinking about DM'ing again, although I love play and have insight that my role-play has become very very rusty.  One thing I really dig is tossing dice and generating PCs and NPCs from random stats.  I find that DCC does this very well with the luck roll and occupation.  I'm off after this to purchase a thing from RPGNow.

Meantime, the other thing I like to do is mapping.  I no longer have reams of maps I made as a wee git, plunging ever downward with my Kayen Telva (lifted from A1 The Slavepits of the Undercity) and magic markers.  However, with my fancypants scanner I am able offer a thing I made last night in a couple of hours, namely the tomb of the Ssessarids, the hideous mercantile family prone to internecine warfare with other traders in the capital city of Thrax.  They were rumored to be snake worshipers who mingled licentiously with reptilian things that slithered up from the pits beneath the capital city.  They searched for long-life or perhaps immortality but instead turned into a degenerate pack of corpse-eaters, lead in the end by a blue-black scaled she-demon.

In the interests of digitizing the thing, I had made a key but chopped it out with PS and cleaned it up with threshold etc.  I intended to feed it into Illustrator as a LiveTrace thing to clean up the lines but, meh.  I ran out of steam.

The entrance is an underground dome with a basin, guarded by caryatid columns who will attack if the players do not cleanse themselves in the basin's waters, first (Although this carries a risk of disease).  Packs of ghouls crawl from the various holes in the structure and broke free to maraud when the hidden entrance was revealed in a rockslide.  The whole complex is highly trapped - the Ssessarids loved Blue Cobra poison and the disfiguring scars that remain should interlopers not die shortly after injection.  At the far end of the complex, 'asleep' on his bier, lies the body of the clan's founder, a ghul sorceror of some potency who does not hesitate to call upon his patron's representative - an elegant Naga with the face of a seductress.  She has ties to the Yuan-Ti, and the crafty Serpent Men who first taught the clan to use and distill poisons, and who coached them in the arts of subterfuge.  Since the geological event that re-opened the tomb, the ghul raiders have swept into the nearby town nightly to feast on children, the elderly, and local beggars.  They had much wealth in life, and are jealous of their gold.

Anyways, it's all there in the map.  As always, the ascent is treacherous so take heede