When I realized my mildly alcoholic Monk could not get drunk anymore

 

Early this year I decided to play in a new campaign of one of my players (also mostly populated by players who were in my campaign). I have only sat down as a player maybe 5% of my gaming life, at most. GM is where my comfort zone is. I ran a Neutral good, meat and potato former soldier fighter I named Chase. 

(edit: remembered I actually came up with him originally about 3 years ago to play in a one shot ran by this girl who was in my regular campaign). 

Not sure he was the best choice for the group. Not that I really knew it at the time, but this would turn out to be a pretty edgelordy gang of characters. They were what he called "a gang of monsters and mendicants."  One of them was literally a monster, a Dhampir. The best of them, a female ranger, was a treasure grubbing murder hobo. Chase was part of the group (actually came in I think a couple games into the campaign...this all started around the holidays when I take most of my vacations) for months and stuck with them because they were sort of escaped prisoners from a cult prison on an island full of cultists and monsters. 

I kind of based Chase on Michael Bains character Hicks from Aliens. A hardened solder but kind and intelligent. He just did not fit with these creep characters haha. It started with him not being the type to jump right on chests. But the other characters did. Everyone took whatever treasure they found for themselves, and Chase swiftly got left behind in terms of power. I was unhappy and decided to try something new. When the characters got back to a civilized city, he ran like hell, got in a coach, and left the party behind without a word. A couple of thousand gold pieces richer, he would not have to find work for a good while. 

So I came up with "Zen" (birthname Sable Rialto).

Zen in her travelling/action gear.

Zen is of the Temple of The Four Master Elements.  The campaign is in the Forgotten Realms, and the temple is in some desert where we have actually ended up and are involved in this and that and bada bing bada boom (really don't need to get into all the typical adventuring and fighting details but fairly basic DnD).

Since the party was getting to higher levels, I figured it was my chance to run a monk already coming into strong power. Besides the elemental stuff, I figured the order to be true neutral. No gods worshipped, but the sun and stars and all things made up of the elements was what they revered. But in philosophy fairly Buddhist in nature. Constant individual search for balance. 

It kind of mirrored to some degree my own path towards balance and a certain enlightenment. I was raised by Catholic European immigrants and growing up that was not a pathway I wanted as I got into adulthood (though you can never really stop having been raised a Catholic). I dabbled in all sorts of spiritual things over the years, and in the last several years I realized that I had been searching for balance, which combined with some other things made me realize I was sort of following a Buddhist path. So nothing hardline, just a philosophy to find greater peace in a mind and heart that was at times in turmoil, especially in these crazy times we live in. 

Anyway, I imagined Zen, a young girl (25 years old but a third-elf so looks 20) whose parents died when she was around 12. Growing up in the monastery, she found herself a bit out of balance and strove for that middle place of peaceful neutrality. Prone to often less than balanced behavior, such as whiskey drinking for fun or to drown sorrows. Now on walkabout in the open world, she challenged herself to be a true ascetic and avoid the indulgences all over the place in the civilized world. This is when she met the party. 

There is a 1993 Hong Kong fantasy film I have long loved called Green Snake (you can find it on Youtube with or without English subs). In this film (and in the original legend) the powerful and self-righteous monk Fa Hai struggles against his "Evil Heart." Not really evil per se, but just trying not to give into earthly desires. So I kind of based Zens struggles for purity on this. 

FYI all the actors in these pics became huge
star in Honk Kong cinema in the 90's after this

So she joined the party all blessing and Namaste to you and all that. But as soon as she got below half her hit points for the first time she started going off the rails. The campaign has really tough battles, and at one point they even fought a small army of lizard men and a T Rex. But eventually we fell afoul of a powerful Lich who did a geas on us. We now had to perform a mission for him. This sent Zen into a shame spiral and she pretty much for a few sessions acted like a petulant child. She always kept whiskey on her and now drank as a full alcoholic. 

But the other game we were in the desert and ended up fighting giant Rocs on a hilltop. At the end of the fight they searched the bodily remains of victims and Zen found one that was a friend monk from the temple. A contemporary Jr. master. She took his awesome bracers (mentioned in previous post) and did rights upon him and burned and collected his ashes. 

By next morning the party had leveled up, and Zens main gain was she was now immune to poison and disease. Oh wait....booze is a poison. Straight up. It would no longer have an effect upon her. 

A new way of running her was in order. What I came up with was that her finding her fellow monks remains and her ritual upon them had a profound effect.  Her new physical immunities were a manifestation of growing consciousness. 

It will now be hard for her to go off the rails. With magic boots, bracers, and staff she is fairly formidable not even counting the elemental powers. So I will run her as righteous, understanding, and steadfast. A sober vegan (no more double meat double cheeseburgers). Even in the face of adversity, she will remain a positive light amongst the monsters and murder hobos. Not a true neutral yet thought. When off the rails she was leaning into chaotic neutral and now it shall be far into the lawful neutral. 

How I approach her journey back to true center will still depend on what happens in sessions to come. Perhaps they will need to get out of the shadow of the Lich before she can do that. But it should be interesting to see how her spiritual journey goes from here. 

Namaste. 

The Best Boots a Monk can have

 

So one of my players started his first DnD campaign not long after I put the group together in the late summer of last year (actually I am in two of my players campaigns and might post about them later). Though I rarely sit down as player, I decided to be supportive and be a part of it. 

I ran a fighter for a long time, a basic meat and potatoes sword and shield ex-soldier type. Not long ago I decided he was not working with the group (a long story, and I may post about that experience at some point, but enough to say for now they were all psychotic, and it is no fun being the sane one ). Characters were levelling up fast and we are 9th level at this point. So I thought that this would be a chance to get to run a high-level monk So I did a half elf master of elements monk I named Zen. 

Zen is inspired in part by Last Airbender characters, and also the monk Fa Hai from the White Snake Chinese legend (specifically my favorite Honk Kong Film "Green Snake" from 1993), who is conflicted and always trying to suppress his "evil heart." She tries to be true neutral, but usually wavers in law and chaos therein. 

The DM early on in the campaign lavished the party with magic items. Good ones. Belts of giant strength and throwing hammers that returned and all kinds of goodies. Lots of stat increasing items. Zen came in with almost nothing. But they were kind enough to give her a staff of stunning which often comes in handy. 

I knew from my experience with the previous character that if you do not jump on chests (and there were lots of chests...DM is a good guy but is new to running and is a video game guy, so, ya know. Lots of loot crates). So, when I brought Zen in I knew what I had to do. Have her jump on any chest we found, and her 45 base movement made it easy. She got this pair of boots. 

Big pimpin'...

Turns out they are Boots of Speed. Lets you cast haste on yourself. At least one other character wanted them, but it was obvious to most. A monk is the best character to have this. 

So if I am calculating right, she can use her movement and action to dash for 90 feet. Haste doubles this. So 180. But Haste also gives you and extra action, which you can use to dash again. So that is a potential 360 feet. That has to be close to 50 miles an hour in real world terms. 

Whatever it is, it's fast. But there are downsides. When your 10 rounds are up, you are helpless for a turn. In a difficult combat, like we are always in, it can be fatal to be helpless for a round. If combat is still hot when it wears off, you will will spend turn 8 or 9 trying to rush to a safe place. But in a dungeon or battlefield there are few safe spaces. She used them twice in a row in the same awful encounter. And when the time came to lose a round in both cases she was in serious dangers. 

The used come back after 24 hours each. If you use the boots three times in 12 hours you will get 4 levels of exhaustion, which is pretty bad. Long recovery times too. 

But shit, they are cool (in a cartoonish kind of way) and hopefully they can be used smartly. But sparingly. 

Cheers

Isle of Dread - what color is your Axe Beak?

 The weekly Isle of Dread campaign continues. 

One thing I have been doing in most sessions is creating my own small random charts to use in that particular session. Early in the campaign while in the big city before the great ocean voyage, I was doing this. So like in the city I would have several things on a table like encounter a troublemaking gang, aggressive panhandlers, an already established enemy NPC, etc. 

So the other session I had one for the beach areas both on the village side of the great wall, and also for the Sharks Bay area on the other side of the wall not far away. I had giant crabs, lions, tiger, axe beaks, etc. On a grassy hill near the sea cliffs of Sharks Bay they randomly encountered some Axe Beaks.

For many years now Axe Beaks have been a staple for coastal areas for me. I don't really know why, But at some point I used them near a beach and this became the environment I liked to have them encountered. 

I actually have loved big flightless Terror Birds since the 2008 film 10000 BC..

Adding to the fun is that these scary carnivorous birds have actually existed, and not that long ago really. They stalked the earth at the same time as early man. 

Of course in DnD they have always been around, and the images have been almost countless..

I have probably used a different image in each encounter I use them in every few years. But when the party on the Island encountered some I did not have an image handy. So into The Google Machine I go. And pretty quick I find an image perfect for Isle of Dread Axe Beaks..

Polly want a human liver?

They made honking and "ookie Dookie" sounds, and the party dubbed them "Ookie Dookie" birds. Certainly not the hardest encounter they will have, but a nice basic fight to keep the blood flowing is good. But it was really fun to come up with a perfect image for an Isle of Dread Axe parrot-like Beak on the spot and hurl it at the characters. 

Cheers

Finally found my Supers RPG to run online?

 

I have posted in the past about my deep background with Supers RPG's (also here), going all the way back to childhood starting with the very first superhero game Superhero 2044. Then Supergame, then Villains and Vigilantes, and finally Champions/Hero System. That was my favorite, and using my futuristic hero setting Haven (based in part on Superhero 2044's Inguria Island) I turned many of my DnD groups on to it as an alternative. There would be resistance (most were not comic book fans) but they would eventually be requesting it. They loved it, despite the crunch of Champs. It was probably my favorite genre, in large part having grown up a comic book kid.

Now several years since the last time I ran a supers session, and also now that I essentially run all games online, I have been hankering to give it a go on Roll20. But the crunch of Champs would make it very hard. I considered Mutants and Masterminds which was fairly popular online, but it has its own high crunch it seems. I don't want to have to learn nor run another crunchy ruleset. 

Interesting note: when I first looked into this about
a year ago, the deluxe book (the most recommended 
as far as character creation choices) was out of print
and going for around 300 bucks where you could find 
it. But it is now apparently around 50 bucks and easily found. 

Last year for a couple session I played online in Kickstarted supers system I can't even remember what it was called. It was based on 5th ed DnD. It was kind of fun, but the guy kind of lost it mid-session and decided the system was no good for what he was doing. He declared he was probably going to try another system, but I passed. Put my search for a system on hold. 

But now in recent weeks I discovered Marvel Multiverse RPG, a fairly new system. I always rejected a licensed supers game, especially based on Marvel or DC, but the attractions of this was it was fairly rules light, and had excellent Roll20 support it seems. I immediately ordered the book off Amazon, and started watching Youtube videos about it. 

It has an odd, what I think is kind of clunky dice rolling system, but it is indeed simple. I can work with it I think. And it based around Marvel is OK. My Haven setting is more or less an alternate future version of the Mavel Universe (I always had it 20 years in the future of whenever I ran it) as a base, though having grown up on comics I was very familiar with Multiverses. I had Haven be a kitchen sink of genres, and other comic universe stuff could enter into it. Sci Fi in general really. I even had a Jedi show up in some old session. 

MM RPG has a rank system to determine your supers level, from street level like Daredevil all the way up to Galactus, and how that all works with the powers is something I need to research more of. Also it is all a little bit of an investment. The physical book was almost 40 bucks, and for Roll20 I will need to buy the in-platform version. For full functionality (sharing rules with players, a character sheet builder, etc) I think I need a subscription to something called Demiplane. But money is not really an object if I could get this off the ground with some decent players. 

I have plenty going on with my DnD right now. But I am around 30 sessions into the campaign and already past the point where I get a wander lust for other genres and systems. So as always it is sort of life raft building time. My research shall continue, but I am hopeful for supers action!

Cheers

Children of Trouble - the D&D Suicide Squad

 So, my Isle of Dread campaign has been going well for months, running almost every week. A couple of months ago we were missing an important player and the discussion began about an alternative I would run when somebody needed could not attend but we still had enough for a session. One player shot down my idea of just starting another secondary campaign starting at 1st level. He wants to start higher, and that does seem to be the trend these days. The other players were fine to start at 1st, but then I started wondering if I wanted another standard campaign starting at 1st. 

So I started pondering. Then the idea came out of the blue, Well, maybe not so out of the blue. Over recent years I had considered this campaign, but the idea was a bit off the beaten path for me. Almost all of my campaigns in my homebrew world I started as a kid happened in or around the west coast kingdom of Tanmoor. Almost 120 years of character continuity there. But for this I thought outside the box. Why not a campaign set in the Acherian Empire on the east coast?

The free kingdom of Tanmoor started over 800 years ago as a colony of Acheria, the first city of the lands of Acheron, based heavily on ancient Rome. A fantasy Roman Empire where they hate non-humans and magic types that were not clerics.

A few decades ago Tanmoor gained independence after many battles across the lands and in Tanmoor itself. A new age of kings and queens had begun in the west. Even during the centuries of Acherian Governors Tanmoor had evolved to be a city diverse in terms of non-human presences (due to proximity to the Wood Elf forests) and in contrast to the Empire proper, Tanmoor was like any DnD city chock full of wizards and all that. Big mages guild and all. 

But in the Empire, an age of decline began after the loss of Tanmoor. Now, Acheria itself was mostly just a place far away that Tanmoorians hated. I never had games set directly in the empire. Or on the upper east coast period. Well, now I am. 

So during those times decades ago when Acheria was sending troops to the west to secure their hold on Tanmoor, and them mostly being trounced in large part due to high level player characters taking part in the struggles, they came up with a specialist group they called The Children of Trouble to send in and counteract the diverse, magic wielding character parties that were devastating the troops. This group was made up of criminals of the empire. Wizards and non-humans. They were given powerful magic items and sent west to challenge the west and its player characters. 

This was way back in the 90's, and I had based the concept of The Children on a group of violent mutant hunters that appeared in X-men comics called The Marauders. The Children of Trouble presented a real challenge for the player characters. The Acherians considered it a successful strategy. But they were a product of their time.

But lately the notion hit me. Why not tap into the concept for this alternate campaign.  So I presented it as having been inspired by The Suicide Squad. They knew the movies, but I collected the comics back in the day, and it made sense. I would run it like that.

Will "Slappy" Smith

Oddball characters, either nonhumans or illegal magic users, who had run afoul of the Empire and earmarked for death in the colosseum but taken into a special prison and inducted into the new Children of Trouble program. 

I started them at 4th level, but would quickly put them to 5th. I gave them some decent starter magic items. Unarmed, dressed in wool prison togas, they were escorted by many guards with war dogs and removed from the regular prisons (where they had anti magic collars, and to an old abandoned and ruined ancient part of the city (as I say the Empire was in decline) where some very old academic buildings were being used as this special prison. 

The Warden. Brutal high level fighter.

Mentor, a high level Wizard and a former
member of the old CoT. He's their handler
at the prison. Fairly kind and somewhat helpful,
He represents the "benefactors" of the CoT
program. In a way he is as much a prisoner
as they are. 

Led into the main building, still partially in ruins and being restored, the characters are shackled, have anti magic collars (created by clerics), and are dressed in light togas. well armored guards and lots of barking guard dogs surround them, as they were told the deal: serve the empire out of the prison and they will find their circumstances improving more and more. If they agree (otherwise back to the main prison and prepped to die in the colosseums) they fight in a testing room lightly armed against archers, and then sent to their tiny crappy cells they will be in until after they are fully proved. Also, they are told that if they escape they have temporary tattooed "glyphs" on the back of their necks that will allow Orcus clerics to cause a demon to be summoned next to them to attack. That takes care of the "exploding collar" type situation the Suicide Squad members are in. 

The demon glyph. I also use it as the home
page image for the campaign. The symol
for the CoT, if you will. 

They get their first mission pretty quick. An area called "the Prefectures" between the twin cities of Acheria and Achium, a once vibrant suburban area fallen into some disrepair like much of the Empire, where a growing bandit gang called The Bloody Red Caps is taking over entire neighborhoods. 

So they went to Sarnath prefecture neighborhood where a couple dozen members of the gang had taken over. They were to send a message by destroying them as brutally as possible. This gang of freaks were certainly very horror show. I had named this session "The doom that came to Sarnath" or "the Bloody Red Caps have a bloody bad day"

The Mastodon, an old school Acherian troop 

transport used to transport CoT when outside 

the city proper. Drawn by warhorsed and driven 

by a pair of half ogre prisoners. 

The assault on the gang in the taverna was one of the most violent sessions I have ever run. My intention in the campaign was to have these mostly combat sessions, with a sort of over the top DnD combat parody vibe. Fantasy Tarantino. Not all the characters are evil, but they are all capable of coming off as terrifying. 

An elf from the Shadow Realm

A death goddess worshipping Dragonborn

An Asian female shape shifter assassin

Goblin artificer, raised by dwarves

Her mechanical familiar

Paladin Aasimir angel sort of character. She has
a halo that can come down over her face and it 
has eyes on it. She is imspired by Nephlim or
something. One of the few non evils

So it was a bloodbath and lots of fun. The CoT went back to the prison and were given access to after mission open air bathhouse with massages, and nice clean linens and better and warmer wool prison tunics, and an hours access to the meal hall for all kinds of decent food and drink. After their next mission they are given a dorm building to habitat, though still well guarded. 

Not only was this Children of Trouble idea and session super fun, but the players came up on their own with a secondary group to run for. Group B. 

A whole 'nother pack of freaks. 

And I have run an intro session for these monsters. Good Golly. I may post about them next, though I can't let the main campaign, Isle of Dread, get lost in the shuffle. This was supposed to be an occasional thing to run. But you gotta give the players what they want. 

Cheers.  

D&D Wokeness issues gets more and more media coverage

 

The whole wokeness invading D&D thing has been discussed on blogs and such for a good while, but it was when Elon Musk recently tweeted the possibility that he might buy it from Hasbro is when I realized this issue was going mainstream. 

The popularity of the game thanks to things like Critical Role has also led to the discovery of famous people having been players at least in the past, which Musk clearly was. Sure, figures such as Vin Diesel and even leftist late night shill Steven Colbert have been known about for a good while. But along with Musk we are finding more. 

Since I started watching a lot of Youtube because I mostly work from home, I have bits of clips I like to watch. One of these is The Hill, a news show that is one of the few balanced options for such. It is usually hosted by one leftist, and one on the right (more or less). 

Host Robby Soave often brings up being a boardgame and DnD geek. So he certainly chimes in on these issues of woke takeover of his beloved pastimes. 

I almost get chills with this stuff. When I was a kid I had to hide my geeky loves. I would leave football practice and sneak off to the history hall (where I knew no teammates would be lurking) to hang out with my dork friends and get my DnD on. Who would have thought it would ever get so mainstream that actual news journalists would be talking about it in a way that was not about satanic panic and dudes getting lost in college maintenance halls?

James Raggi and The Albatross?

 

Yah, its weird to me to be making a post regarding LOTFP stuff two times in a row, but I saw something that got my goat a bit and got me thinking.

Like I mentioned at one point in that last post, I've gotten to like James Raggi. I never disliked him, I never knew him other than a small contact online with him a decade and a half ago. 

But as I show in that last post I've got a bit of interest in some of the stuff he has brewed up. Plus for some months I have followed him on his FB, looking in to see what he is up to with his business and life in general. Health issues (the guy apparently has leg problems, but travels the world for con appearances to sell boxes of merch, so good on him). What seems to be very early jaunts to local small heavy metal shows. And making the occasional youtube video, often out in the snows of Finland. Yeah, I have developed a sort of fascination, but also a certain fondness. I think in the last post I stated he had a sort of "grotty charm," and that if he did live plays of him GMing his stuff, I would watch them. A fan? I dunno. I have never used any of his stuff in my games, but that does not mean I have no interest. 

I guess I have paid attention for some years. When the Zak Smith cancellation thing went down (Zakgate?), I read about him somewhere having to cut ties with Smith for the sake of his business, and in the following year or so him suffering personally from it. Crying in his sleep, soiling the sheets. I don't know enough to be able to determine for myself if this was hurt over a true friend, or just frustration with cancel culture in general. But hell, he seemed to recover from it. He seems to be doing fairly well in recent years without his association with Smith. 

Before I looked at his Facebook, I did see a thread reprinted somewhere a couple or three years ago. An argument between James and Zak apparently about James not working with him anymore. It was kind of brutal. I don't remember all the details, but the gist seemed to be poor James getting gaslighted over it all, and James at one point stating simply "all I know is your life keeps hurting my business." To the point, and yeah pretty fair. Protect the business. An actual money making business. 

Then in more recent times I noticed that James would complain about some regular real-world issue, and often ZS would chime in "what are you going to do about it?" I mean, it happened all the time. Like, this guy is supposed to be his conscious?  It was happening enough that I wondered if it was just some kind of performance art. Often ZS would just fully make it about himself and start laying out his own misfortune and why isn't anybody helping and doing anything about it? Ok, whatever. The guys are friends I guess so you tolerate a certain amount of things for the sake of the friendship. But it kind of smacked of the bullying of a fairly mild dude to me. 

Fair enough, but now James has tied his business back in with Zak. He gives ZS a couple of minutes to have his say about the new relationship.

Big news, in some circles. OSR? I'm kind of out of touch. In the last 5 years I have been using 5th ed, and I have mentioned both Zak and LOTFP in casual conversations about various gaming themes, and not a single person has heard of them. But I guess there are enough people in those certain circles, because as I said before James seems to be doing well. 

But some things about Zaks comments here kind of got my goat. Not just the simple "weird metal head who says and does fucked up shit" comment. But he called Raggi "stupid and cowardly."

Was James stupid and cowardly for breaking from working with Zak? Or was he being a smart businessman having to make a hard decision like many businessmen do? But whatevs, to me the standout here is that James Raggi is offering Zak Smith a new lease on his work (Zak made a post about being "brought back from hell") by bringing him back into the business that seems to be doing very well without him. The insults are kind of harsh in light of that. It kind of bothers me.

OK, so on Raggi's FB we once again have his friend making something that is positive for James all about himself and the negatives of his life. Will it hurt the business? Who knows. James is elated at somebody making a positive review of LOTFP, and because the person/people in question were part of the "hate mob" (I'm no expert and really don't know who most of the actors in all this in the last 5 years are) Zak makes it about the negatives in his life and seems to endorse people bothering the reviewer about it. One commentator on the thread does just that, in fairly nice terms, but yeah makes it all about ZK and his issues. 

Christopher 'Staples' O'Dell

Done. This is what I posted:

Great to see you continuing to review LotFP material.

I recently heard that you used to have reviews of three of Zak Sabbath's books – A Red and Pleasant Land, Vornheim, and Maze of the Blue Medusa, the first two of which are LotFP – but I'm not seeing them in your Reviews playlist anymore.

Between the court cases and the Clio Belle Weisman's Medium piece, it seems to be clear that Zak is innocent of the abuse charges that were leveled at him in the OSR community.

Would you be willing to put your reviews of Zak's material back up? If not, would you be willing to explain your reasoning?

I'm a very happy backer of Knave 2e and have been using it for my gaming. It's a great system and I want to be able to continue to support you with a clear conscience. Thanks!

Oookay. Honestly, Zak has a handful of super dedicated faithful (one guy who I think is named Semen in Ukraine pops up a lot as a staunch defender in Zak threads and has a blog that seems entirely about repeating Zaks talking point) who seem to step right in line with ZS's wants and I don't know if this guy is one of them. But yeah, somebody who was positive about Raggi's business is suddenly targeted with Zakness. Old negatives being hauled out. Of course, not being stupid nor cowardly James is not happy (I could screenshot some stuff, but I don't want to do that from somebody's social media, but here are snippets)

James Edward Raggi IV

oh for fuck's sake if the result of Ben reviewing LotFP is him getting bombarded by people bugging him about Zak (pro or con) the fucking result is going to be him not reviewing LotFP stuff anymore.

Zak Smith

James Edward Raggi So you let the bad guy who participated in cannibalizing your company because you want his attention. I am not in on that

Me, me, me. 

Look, I have no dog in this fight. A decade and a half ago I posted about Zak and company and was fairly complimentary, though I was not especially informed on everything regarding it all. Back then I had come off of years of listening to Howard Stern and that leaked into my blogging vibe. Now I'm a lot older and kind of identify as a Buddhist because of my constant search for balance and peace, so I don't want to judge. But I simply cannot wonder if James has made a major boo boo by essentially going backwards at a time when things seem to be going well. People (including humble old me in my last post) saying positive things about him and his work. Is it all going to have a taint of somebody else's apparent negativity and life problems attached to it from here on out? 

I mildly followed the Zak controversies in recent years. I'm not that informed these days on the general gaming community out there. I mainly look at some posts by Tenkar and one or two others. But it is a fascination story, and at some point I found myself having some sympathy for Smith. I saw a post where he had teeth pulled and an eviction notice due to lack of funds (sadly for the most part probably lining the pockets of lawyers). I get it. He got me too'd pretty hard. But is what he now brings to the table going to be an improvement for Raggi and his bottom line? If that line gets damaged, will it be out of his sense of friendship, or raging against the machine that cancels both a person and their works? I dunno. I could not offer advice because in my life I have not always made the best choices in terms of the friends I chose or the causes I championed. So I will try not to judge others in those regards. I can only wish Raggi the best with his business. I'm actually thinking of buying one of those 300 buck prestige format Virginia game packs i would likely never run just to more quietly support him. And I'm going to hope, like I would for anybody, his choices don't hurt him. Whatever those choices are, I won't think of him as stupid or cowardly. 

Cheers

All reactio

A True Relation of the Great Disastrum of Virginia

Since starting to work mostly from my home office the other year I watch a hell of a lot of YouTube. I have to be honest. I find it fairly distracting. All these 10 to 20 minute bits on all kinds of subjects I like or have interest in.

So every now and again a short, James Raggy video will pop up. So kind of more in touch with his stuff than i've ever been really. I had moments of fascination about some lotfp stuff such as years ago, hearing about the module, Death Frost Doom being a rip off of one of my old favorites, the Lichway from White dwarf magazine (as it turns out, only the ending gimmick was, but otherwise the Lichway was a far more approachable and gameable adventure module in general).

So, the other year he had a giant PDF sale with rock-bottom prices and I picked up a handful just to finally satisfy my curiosity about some things I didn’t want to spend more than a couple of bucks on. I still haven’t brought myself to read even the barest fraction of the stuff. There might be some tiny bits to steal, but overall a lot of the stuff just doesn’t fit with how I do things for my old school game world but I do believe that old style DND in itself is generally fairly weird unless you really try to make it not so. Back in the 80s I remember us playing albums with our games like John Michael Jarre’s strange Zoolook which is pretty weird and inspired lots of creep. But certainly not “your characters penis turns into a live eel” kind of creep. 

Over a decade ago in the early and chaotic beef-filled days of my blogging I remember messaging James regarding how he found players for his game in the city he was not native to. I got a quick reply and he seemed like a nice guy. I didn’t explore his stuff over the years because I generally don’t really purchase a whole lot of game material, again, I really don’t know how much use I would’ve gotten out of any of it. I supposed at some point, I’ll take a closer look at some of those PDFs bought for a song. I think I got Red and Pleasant Land and I'd like to see what the fuss is about. Vornheim just kind of baffled me. I run a lot of city stuff and certainly not how that is presented. 

So some time ago a Raggi Youtube video popped up. I always tend to pay a bit of attention. I kind of like the guy. I knew a lot of metal heads back in the day in Venice Beach, but he seems fairly harmless and amiable compared to those sketchy chuckleheads. It was mostly the metal loving surfers I got in to scrapes with in the beach parking lots (the movie Point Break had a lot of true to life bits in it). I mean there is some ick there. I mentioned in a previous post some time ago about his comments about "why would you bother cleaning the inside of your toilet"(uh...maybe cuz it is in the house, and maybe a girl will come over?). But fair enough. I don't think he drinks, but I could see having a beer and a shot with him and talking some games. Since I've been of a mind to leave the country in recent years I would probably also ask his advice on being a stranger in a strange land. 

But anyway, he introduced this...

“Being an Account of the Rising of a new Star to the West of the Virginia Colony,
And its Derangements of Space,
The Engines of a Second Creation,
Rains of Fishes and burninge Coales,
The Mazement thus brought to Heathen and Christian,
And the Prodigies, Sports of Nature, and invasive Creatures from Spheres beyond,
Now disportinge upon the Earth

After years of raids and massacres, the Powhatan Confederacy and the Virginia Colony find themselves in an uneasy peace. The people of Jamestown and outlying plantations again trade with Powhatan neighbors, and English planters again ship tobacco to markets across the Atlantic.

Then the land to the west of Powhatan territory seems to rupture skyward, a new star rising into the sky. Down the James River soon come reports of strange happenings, strange beasts, and stranger people.

The English were not the only ones seeking a New World.

A True Relation of the Great Disastrum of Virginia, 1633 is a campaign for use with Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-Playing and other traditional role-playing games. This set comprises a sourcebook for the Virginia Colony, rules for exploring an altered wilderness, keyed encounters both in Virginia and far beyond, new Magic-User spells and miscast tables, and more than eighty new monsters”.

So, a high-quality campaign set, some kind of prestige format, and very different it seems from his usual modules with titles like "The Whores Bloody Guts" or "Honey, I fucked the kids."

Super interesting, I think. Colonizer days? Possibilities there (probably triggering in our current soy-boy society. Inspired by "Annihilation?" Cool. Super high quality and something like 300 bucks? Yow. Do you get a pdf with it so you can wrap the books in lead and put them in a safe?

My first thoughts though when I heard about it was "how the hell would I get players for this?" Is there a LOTFP forum with a player search thread? Because its getting hard enough to get players for DnD in the Roll20 forums. I want to do some Runequest and am mostly afraid of being to find enough players for it. Or at least a mixed gender group. I hate sausage fests. But not sure how the ladies, or even dudes I guess, would feel about running characters in buckle shoes and big stove pipe type hats (also with buckles). Stuff usually associated with Thanksgiving. Though The Witch (VVitch?) film was cool. I might use that as an example. 

It has struck me that this might work for Call of Cthulhu, and couched with that in mind may be the easiest ways to approach players. I do have a thing for different historical periods for CoC. I see Drive Thru has the PDF for 25 bucks, and I'm thinking of getting that just out of pure curiosity. 

I sure as hell would love to see some live play of this. It has been out awhile, but I see nothing. Not even a review. So maybe this is so far just being bought in the expensive form by the faithful and placed in protective plastic on shelves. But Raggi himself, with his odd, grotty charm, should be doing videos of him running this for some people.