Road Runners, Swamp LARPing & Hannah Barbarians: Influences

James Raggi, he of the lamentably long blog title, has challenged his readers to list their gaming influences. I'm late to the podium and all the good answers are already taken, so here are some of my own haphazard influences.

As with many others Howard, Lewis, Lovecraft and Vance are definitely influences, especially the latter two. I cut my teeth on Conan and the Pevensies, and reread The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, The Dying Earth and the Cugel tales every couple years. I could also write about latter-day Lovecraftian Thomas Ligotti, or Julian May's Saga of Pliocene Exile, or Bradbury's October Country, or Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber. Perhaps I should say a word or two about Gygax's Dungeonland modules, EX1 and EX2, two of my long-time favorites.

But in truth many of my influences are quite a bit less high-falutin'. I've described my ideal D&D setting as a hybrid of Thundarr and Barbarella, and my current passion for Encounter Critical and Mutant Future brings that sort of pop culture bricolage surging to the fore. Rather than discuss five influences separately I'm just going to ramble about a bunch of things in the context of the TV and books I loved as a lad.

Swords & Saturdays / Hannah Barbarians
The earliest role-playing I can remember doing is racing around the house on Saturday mornings, hopped up on Cocoa Puffs, running at top speed from the back den to the living room at the front of the house only to stop on a dime, say "Beep beep!" and tear off again. Such is the foundation of my sophisticated gaming tastes.

Throughout my childhood I spent many a Saturday watching TV off and on all day long, and even now I'm inspired not just by the heroic adventure and strange monsters of the Herculoids, Jonny Quest, the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon and Thundarr, but also by the slapstick and surrealism of Pee Wee's Playhouse and Looney Toons. The day I figure out how to make the Freleng Door Gag work in a dungeon I'll be a very happy monkey.

If I could get away with it, many an afternoon would find me back in the den after lunch. The local stations had chopsocky movies, the Creature Feature on WXON-20 (which rocked the freak-out bit from Zepp's "Whole Lotta Love" during its bumper!) or the Chiller Thriller on WKBD-50. I soaked in everything from dubbed Shaw Brothers flicks to Hammer Films to Godzilla and a parade of other kaiju.

Dad's garage/The Salvation Army
Lest you think I spent all my free time sprawled in front of the idiot box or caroming off the walls, I should say that I've always been an avid reader as well*. Since so many of the pulp and fantasy legends who influence me have already been written about, let's talk about dime novels, trashy paperbacks, and hand-me-down books by hack writers.

I remember looking at the marvelous reading lists in Gygax's DMG and in Moldvay Basic, but I can't pretend they directed my reading much. In fact many of the books of my youth were fantasy, horror and sci-fi paperbacks I came by more or less randomly-- browsing yellowing books filed two deep on the shelves above my dad's tool cabinet in the garage, or the used books at the Salvation Army thrift shop or the paperback SF section at the library. I can't even tell you the authors or titles of most of these books. Probably just as well forgotten.

Nonetheless, for all the crummy cliched tales I read of lone American ninjas or post-apocalyptic soldiers, there were glints of gold among the dross. The swords and sorcery epic about a sea turtle cursed by an evil wizard into the body of a human warrior and questing to return to the ocean had a memorable high concept going for it if nothing else. Then there was the eerie yarn about a modern man who explores a series of tunnels connecting one tenement basement to another and ends up trapped in a cavernous svartalfheim beneath the earth. Or the one about a dystopian near future in which assassins compete in an annual international killing tournament that ends with a duel so absurd it's awesome: the last two standing square off in a frozen arena with battle axes and ice skates!**

Of special note is Steve Vance's (no relation to Jack) Planet of the Gawfs. I found this one at the SA thrift in a white label "generic" edition rather than the groovy cover shown here. The plot is as garish as the cover: a virus causes grotesque mutations in those it doesn't kill outright, and the surviving God AWful Freaks are exiled to a distant jungle planet, where Lord of the Flies shenanigans ensue. A few mutants manage to hijack a starship and return to earth to seek REVENGE! Was it a big steaming pile? Very possibly. But there's this: I haven't owned or read the book in 25 years and I can recall all of the above and a scene in which the starship's intercom is explained to a primitive mutant as "Magic talking box. Much ju ju." A work of art for the ages it ain't, but this kind of mutants and mayhem is just the gonzo ju ju I love in my games.


*And lest you think I never went outside at all, be it known that I spent many an afternoon slogging through the wooded marsh behind our house, wielding a stout hardwood cudgel, battling my way through rotten limbs and thickets in lieu of legions of orcs. Yes, I was a solo LARPer, this is my shocking true tale.

**If you can identify any of these books, please leave a comment!

SEE ALSO: The ORIGINAL Illustrated Catalog Of ACME Products

SEE ALSO: Monster Index at GiantMonsterMovies.com

MP3: Phillip Johnston's Big Trouble, Powerhouse (Out of Print - Used CD)
MP3: The Moog Cookbook, Whole Lotta Love (Compact Disc - Download)

Death Machines

Gamma World's ultimate foe is the Death Machine. A flying robotic artillery platform powered by a self-contained nuclear plant. Bristling with laser batteries, blasters, rocket launchers, and a fusion bomb mortar -- depending on the weapons array deployed it is capable of dealing an average damage of 2000 points per round. Of course targets at close range face six black ray guns and four trek guns, which skip the dice and just instakill or disintegrate if they hit, no saving throw. An energy dampener fries the circuits of all robots within 60 meters and overloads all but the strongest force fields, while the death machine's own force field can absorb 400 hp before failing. The tarrasque would roll over and pee itself if a death machine hovered by.

That said, the illustration of this city-levelling gunship is strangely unimposing:

It's a crisp, typically excellent Elmore drawing, but static and draftsmanlike. It just doesn't evoke the sort of jelly-kneed, tongue swallowing, mad scrambling panic one hopes for in a 15m wide flying saucer of destruction.

Consequently I've taken to imagining the Death Machine differently. It's not sleek and streamlined. In fact it's a clanking, tank-treaded, earthbound lummox. But if you want to crush the mutants, drive them before you, and hear the lamentations of their androids...


...this, my friends, is a death machine:


MP3: Massive Attack vs. Mad Professor, Backwards Sucking (Heat Miser) [Compact Disc - Downloads]

A Boy and His Dog Guinea Pig

I recently picked up a copy of Gamma World's Second Edition. I've written briefly about my love for this game, but I haven't owned it since 1990. Inspired by the image below, here's the first GW character I've diced up in twenty years. Quite happily, he illustrates how plumb loco, how out of hand this game can be.


Big Billy Cheroot

Big Billy was born to rodent farmers in the NewLenz Fens, in a year of Bad Water. Most of the kids and livestock born that year grew at an enormous rate, too fast for their lungs and bones. They died trying to stand. Billy was one of the few to survive that dark time. He grew tall and strong, four meters high by age of nine, and kept right on growing.

By the time he was a teenager he was doing the work of many hands. He had a knack for jerry-rigged tools and an easy way with the stock. The meanest bull nutria gentled to his touch, and he never failed to holler back a stray jennypig.

Unfortunately Billy just couldn't keep out of trouble. Every few weeks some snake-hooded menarl would come itching to fight, or badder buckaroos would jump him on his way back from the levee. Gators, stink-lions, poomers and worse came marauding the farms so regular you could time your planting by 'em. To spare his folks more rough whiles, Big Billy hit the highway, taking with him an enormous jennypig name of Cavvy, his lifelong pet.

MP3: Jelly Roll Kings, I'm a Big Boy Now [Compact Disc - Digital]

Stats after the break!

Big Billy Cheroot, The Man with No Home

MS: 11 (17 vs. Mental Attack)
IN: 13
DX: 10
PS: 20 (+5 damage)
CH: 10
CN: 13
HP: 64
AC: 5

Mutations
Physical
New Body Parts: Poison sting finger, intensity 9-18, 5 doses/day.
Sonic Blast: 3-18 damage to all within 15m radius
Taller: 8m tall, +6 ST, +8 to hit, +6 HD

Mental
Heightened Brain Talent: +2 figure out artifacts, +4 MS vs. Mental Attack
Heightened Intelligence: +4 figure out artifacts, +2 MS vs. Mental Attack
Improved Symbiotic Attachment: Control one creature touched; requires Melee & Mental Attack; dies if controlled creature dies. Maintains a permanent bond with Cavvy while within 1100m.
Summoning: Summon and command any creature of IN 4 or less within 1km, duration concentration, 1/12 hrs.
Unconscious Summoning (Defect): When at peace for two weeks or more, all natural enemies within 1km seek Billy out until he fights something.

Equipment

Fiber Armor & Shield
Two-Handed Sword (of normal size, wielded one-handed),
serape, boots, camping gear, and very large bedroll.

Cavvy (mutant guinea pig): HD 10d12, HP: 77, AC: 9, Move: 16km/900m/24m, Mutations - Gas Generation (bad-smelling and irritating, no other effects), Sound Imitation (immune to Sonic Blasts, mimicry), Taller

In the Rage

[Fiction written under the influence of Gamma World, the X-Men, Harlan Ellison and, ah, Guns n Roses, ca.1987.]

     Fifty feet from the trees and the sonic blaster whines. Fifty feet from safety and Rran screams, falls, skull shrieked to crumbs. Don't look back, run stumbling run. Run for trees and shadows. Don't look back. Dagg Nazty in the jungle, alone. The last, weaving through vines and blotchy leaves.

     And come the White Knights.

     They hadn't killed him yet. No, they musn't. Jungle swallows him whole and he's in territory. Another shadow born in, borne by the forest. Dust purple skin moist with sweat, longtall cadaver, chest heaving.

     Further in. Come the Clean Knights.

     Quick up behind twisted trees, pressed close to bark, in the breathing Jungle. Manic greengrey eyes wide with fear. Listens, hears the rustle and snap of pursuit, crack and breaking branches. They hadn't killed him yet, no they won't.

     Springs away, with soft rasp of stained claws on bark and swish of loose rags. Crossbow bounces on back and a quiver of steel bolts. Forceblade strapped to his side, switched off and dormant. Dodges under and over tangle of underbrush, creepers, crawlers, and no flowers except the ones that bite. Panting, he runs ahead.

     Dagg Nazty in the lead at nightfall. In the Jungles, groan and moan, skitter and squealings of large things eating small things in shadows. He halts and climbs to safe tree roost. Under mottled leaf canopy, he rests. And waits. Deep black night noisy with survival and malice and the whistling of deformed insects.

     He drowses fitfully, rocked asleep by fear, and shook to waking by anger. He is the last, all friends gone. Killed. Rran gone. Asp gone. Xarta gone. And Braal.

     But not him. Never, not ever. Mind seethes, teeth grind. Rage thickens, coils in loud darkness. Rage that smears greasy and rips jagged. Rage any color but white. Unhuman, freak, DNA casualty, and all that they called him, cursing and spitting. Dirty mutant bastard. Not pure like us. Their words dissolve like poison in his mind. Teeth glisten in his sharp face, a tight grim scowl. Fingers twitch.

     Dagg Nazty in the Rage. They could hate, and he could hate.

     He waits, midnight, after midnight, dead of night. Angry sleep and no peace. And somewhere, them. The White Knights, the Clean Knights, huddled around a glowcube, unsettled in the dark and shivering for day. He waits, twilight, and just before dawn...

     Glower of sun, glower of gloom. He wakes from halfsleep and stretches, taut and wiry. Glances down and steps from his branch, plummets lightly to damp ground. He twists off in a new direction, watching, listening.

     Curves back slitherlike at his hunters. Hides in shadows. Crawls on thorns. Stealth and fury. Slow, slowly, the long way around and behind. Hours. Minutes.

     Still of noon and there, only fifty feet away, through unbreezed tendril curtains. He hears the sound of vines hacked, shoved aside. The sound of a voice. He moves even slower now, muscles strung tense, bound frenzy growing. In the Rage.

     It reaches out, peers around broken trees, whispers along the ground, sinuous, in undergrowth and brambles.

     Soon.

     He unstraps his crossbow and quiver and leaves them aside. Clutches tight the hilt of his forceblade, strokes the trigger switch. And there. Closely seen and alone, white armored and so clean, gaze jumping and eyes nervous. One of them. One of the pure. The White stands frightened, turns side to side, shaky hands holding shudder rifle. Nazty sneers and chuckles. The White whirls in his direction, mouth open, "Brother Mikl, are you--"
                         as Dagg Nazty, body jerking, mind clenching, howls and sends the Rage, tangible and lancing mind to othermind, serpent whip, brainknife. The White gasps, cries pain, hands on temples and tripping backwards
                    as Dagg Nazty leaps at the falling form, forceblade slashing into humming blue existence at midswing, slices soft neck flesh and through, and winks out...

     Pretty scarlet and mud spatters clean white sheatharmor and the body crumples to the dirt. Eyes festering with joy, he breathes hissing and flatly, "Welcome to the Jungle. You looked lonely."

     Dagg Nazty joins the Hunt.

Fiendish Quartet #4

(Concluding a series of D&D campaign brainstorming based on the 1e Fiend Folio.)

Gamma Weird

One of the charming things about the 1st Edition Fiend Folio is the way that truly fearsome monsters like the iconic githyanki on the cover, or the horrid grell (a hovering, octopoid brain) share pages with misfit critters like the flail snail or the adherer (a mummy wrapped in flypaper, more or less). The 1e monster books are all much closer to the homebrewed roots of the hobby; they are less professional, less 'art-directed' both in the literal sense and in the figurative sense that they resist any overall tone or coherent vision. None more so than the Fiend Folio, much of which was drawn from fan submissions to British gaming magazine White Dwarf. The fiends within often don't make any kind of sense together, but there is a lot of freedom in the juxtaposition of the goofy and the gruesome.

Even the goofiest critters have their place in a Gamma Weird campaign: Flail away, flail snail! Glue mummies, stick around! Poisonous beetles camouflaged as treasure? Check. Mangy cadaverous skunk-weasels? Got 'em, natch. Giant mosquito lobsters? The more, and the more ridiculous, the merrier! Gamma Weird is post-apocalyptic D&D, and from where I sit the only way to play the apocalypse is for laughs.

Now, I don't mean a combination of D&D and Gamma World, a science-meets-fanstasy mix-up. I mean, that is awesome, no question. But what I have in mind is more like D&D rewritten as Gamma World:

A high fantasy realm is thrown utterly into chaos by a world-spanning magical catastrophe. Cities are destroyed by arcane forces, and the knowledge of ten thousand years is buried in the wreckage. The minds and flesh of men and beasts are warped by polymorphic energies. There are no large states, no kingdoms -- at best the land is a feudal patchwork, and most people subsist in scattered unconnected villages. Low-level spells and some simple magic weapons and devices survive, but unpredictable magical effects can make them chancy to use.

Those adventurers who seek more powerful magic will have to quest for it. Lacking a shared history and culture, social structure and mores vary wildly from town to town, so travellers may find the ways of even their neighboring villages strange. In the untracked leagues between settlements the land itself has grown eldritch and strange, rocks, rivers and hills twisted by the magical apocalypse. Creatures both comical and deadly hunt the countryside and haunt the ruined cities of the ancients, but the greatest danger the adventurers face may be the very sorceries they hope to master.

On the Beach and At the Table

A post the other day on Dr Rotwang's I Waste The Buddha With My Crossbow, about Rush, a kitchen table and his "personal nerd nirvana" has me thinking all the way back to 1984, and one of my own gaming epiphanies.

Summer vacation, and I'd talked my folks into buying me the 2nd Edition of Gamma World on a day trip to Saugatuck--back in the day you could get your sci-fi apocalypse down at the five-and-dime. For what remained of our two weeks away, I spent most of each afternoon in a small bedroom facing Lake Michigan, windows on three sides, with lake breezes and afternoon sun lazing through the curtains, reading through the rulebook, rolling up characters, and daydreaming about the badass mutants on the cover. I stretched out on the floor and listened to the radio hoping for my favorite songs of the time--Billy Idol, "Eyes Without a Face" or Prince, or Wang Chung, or Eurythmics.

Those notes are long gone now, of course. Fool for nostalgia that I am that makes me a little sad. But here's the thing: I've got a dining room table. I've got plenty of dice and lots of room to spread out. And I've got stacks of music. Perfect moments are fleeting. In this life you're on your own.

MP3: Prince, Let's Go Crazy (Live, 1985)
See also: Top Hits of 1984; Michigan in Pictures: South Haven