Major Komo Domo, Lizard Lancer

My next Encounter Critical character....mutated lizard man with cranial feelers and a thermic lance, with a giant sand reptile mount. Oh internet, tonight I love thee.


(Illustration by Alan Jeeves, for the science fiction/fantasy zine Stardock, ca. 1970)

Brewmaster of the Round Rock Hills

Here's an excerpt from a submission I'm working on for Fight On! #2, "Grapes & Grain: Unusual and Magical Potables.":

Though the dwarvish love of ale is well known, the challenges faced by dwarven brewers go unremarked. Barley, wheat and hop vines do not, after all, grow without sun. Grain and hops are major commodities for merchants and traders in dwarven lands, worth their weight in uncut gemstones.

Trade is not the only method the dwarves have for keeping their tankards full. In at least one case they have even taken up ploughshares. The poor and penurious dwarves of the Round Rock Hills have begun growing their own grain, clear cutting trees, hewing sweeping terraces out of the Hills' southern slopes and building sturdy walls with the stone they've moved. Unfortunately good fences have not made good neighbors of the free-roaming wild elves who hunt and camp in the Round Rocks.

Skirmishes are not uncommon. Most observers, however, credit one unusual personage with keeping a grumbling sort of peace. It's a peace not forged with diplomacy, but brewed in the great copper vats of the Leaf and Anvil, Thuriel Nidalfir, proprietor. Thuriel, who built his wayhouse and brewery with the spoils of an adventurer's career, has a more cosmopolitan view than most Round Rocks folk. A wild elf with a peculiar fascination for dwarvish culture, affecting stooped posture, a wispy beard and a cloth-of-copper kilt, Thuriel is somewhat of a figure of fun among dwarves and elves alike. Nonetheless, his easygoing charm, backed up by a staff of doughty henchmen, makes the wayhouse a place where all of the people of the Hills can take their leisure.

But it is for Thuriel's gift as a brewer that the Leaf and Anvil is celebrated, especially for the eponymous house blend, a smooth black and tan made with crisp Redleaf Ale and a dark stout called Loam. In addition to being eminently quaffable, this blend has the curious and apparently non-magical property of improving reaction roles between elves and dwarves by 1 (or 10%, depending on reaction table used).

I have to thank S John Ross for inspiring Thuriel with his comments on this post over Jeff's Gameblog way.

MP3: Rustavi Choir, Chakrulo [Compact Disc - Downloads]
(This could be the song of dwarves going to war over grain; lyrics after the break.)

We must promise an oath at Khidistavi and must become blood brothers
We must attack Mukhran Batoni
Because of Mukhran Batoni I can't even have a basket of wheat
I can't bring up a heifer and can't thresh the field with a bull
You, the sword forged in Khevsureti
King Erekle sanctified you and blessed you for the war
Enemy, you defeated me, but I don't cry...
I have often been in similar straits but have never whined
Let me grind the sword
And you will reap what you have sown for me

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]

Songcatching: Idumea

I've always disliked the contemporary lyric of Amazing Grace, "how sweet the sound, that saved a soul like me." Originally the word was wretch, and I prefer it that way. After all, what is the point of grace if not to raise up the wretched? The song is already threatened with banality by the resounding echo of a hundred years of perfunctory recorded versions. "Wretch" is for me the song's last sharp, aching tooth, without which it is defanged.

I say this as a non-believer. Nonetheless, I share the longing for grace, for transcendence, for the numinous. This longing may well be innate in us humans, reaching up from the deep limbic wells of our consciousness. Just as innate, perhaps, is our capacity for wretchedness. Idumea is a much less known hymn written at about the same time as Amazing Grace. It is a far starker, even fearsome, treatment of the gap stretching between grace and wretchedness:

And am I born to die?
To lay this body down!
And must my trembling spirit fly
Into a world unknown?

A land of deepest shade,
Unpierced by human thought;
The dreary regions of the dead,
Where all things are forgot!

Soon as from earth I go,
What will become of me?
Eternal happiness or woe
Must then my portion be!

Waked by the trumpet sound,
I from my grave shall rise;
And see the Judge with glory crowned,
And see the flaming skies!

I listened to this song this afternoon, and it broke me open. I should have expected it to; music is as close as I get to prayer. We are, of course, born to die. It is one of those truths so obvious that most of us confront it only in extremis. And all of us, believers or not, must also face in this life the choice between happiness and woe, between fear and relief, and sometimes must endure shadow and drear before we reach home. This song is a beacon.

MP3: Marc Almond, Idumea
MP3: Shirley Collins, Idumea
Both versions from the Current 93 album Black Ships Ate the Sky [Compact Disc & Downloads]

SEE ALSO: Idumea is a classic of the shape-note repertory, and many more versions can be found here.

"Those are some expensive coloring books, son"

I think the frogemoth and Fraz-Urb'luu are by Jim Holloway, but they aren't signed. Could someone confirm that?

SEE ALSO

Jim Holloway's webpage

Russ Nicholson interview

David C. Sutherland III at wikipedia

D.A.Trampier at wikipedia

SEE ALSO: Crayola Color Chronology

How I Played the Game, Then & Now

I've been thinking about James Raggi's post from the other day, asking the question "Is this how D&D is supposed to be played?" One thing I know for sure? I never played it the right way!

I was about 8 years old when I started hearing about this cool game from a kid at school. Dungeons and Dragons. He didn't play himself. He just liked bragging about his older brother's god-killing rampage through the heavens and the hells. Fascinated, I asked for the Moldvay Basic set for Christmas, and dove right into it. What I did wrong was treating the game like a very elaborate kind of solitaire. I never found anyone else to game with!

I'm exaggerating, a little. But my strongest memories of the game are lonely. The hobby shop in town was devoted to model kits and trains, and had only a small selection of D&D books, modules, and minis. I tried going to a few open sessions at the local rec center but was always one of the youngest kids. The hazing I suffered might have been more friendly than I realized, but the eye-rolling over my painstakingly colored-in Monster Manual withered me. When an older player demanded my character draw from a Deck of Many Things before joining up with his party I just about cried. Yeah, I guess I was a pretty wimpy kid. I couldn't even catch a break from my confessor: the D&D playing junior priest at St Joe's took one glance at my halfling archer in leather armor and pronounced him "monster fodder." Faith, Hope and Charity my ass, Father Geoff!

I did play with some kids closer to my age, but we couldn't meet very often, and never finished a module, let alone develop an ongoing campaign. This was true in high school as well. All of my close friends were gamers, but it was a large and scattershot group. Mostly we rolled up new characters, played the start of an adventure and then broke off to shoot the shit and watch videos, never to pick up that particular scenario again. There were some pretty good runs through Pitz Burke and Legion of Gold and Tsojcanth, but the tales were never told in full.

So, yeah, I played wrong. I played with markers and crayons. I played by poring over the AD&D manuals, drawing maps, rolling up characters and running them through the Caves of Chaos or random-chart dungeonhacks. I played by making an analog spreadsheet on graph paper of all of the gods in Deities & Demigods along with their alignments, divine portfolios, favored colors, and symbols. I filled in the blanks in the artifact section of the DMG, assigning all of the powers minor, major and primary, and all of the effects malevolent and benign.

I wasn't playing the "right way," no, but I loved it. Coming back to RPGs after many years, I still find a lot of joy in the solitary aspects of the hobby, character making, rules-tinkering, adventure writing. But I'm not the shrinking lilac I was back in the day, nor the distracted teenager, and I'm ready to play to the fullest. Starting off easy, catching pick-up games when I can, while actively seeking a group to meet with regularly. I have my favorite games, but I'm open-minded: I just want to get together with some folks and throw some dice! In the short term I'll just be a player. In the long run, when I get the confidence to run a game, my plan is more diabolical. Look out! Or, look me up.

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