D30 folks you met in prison

D30-ish fellow prisoners and their disposition

1. Alice Lively:  Friendly
2. Aggravated Karl: Hostile
3. Cap'n: Neutral
4. Carnie Asada:  Neutral
5. Cat-Fart / Puke: Hostile
6. Chafey & Slick Nethers: Friendly
7. Gaurmish: Neutral
8. Grumbles / Mumbles: Neutral
9. Handsome Glauk / Prettyboy Thor: Neutral
10. Hapless / Lucky: Friendly
11. Jah-Balance: Friendly
12. Jenny Quid: Neutral
13. Li'l Debbie: Friendly
14. Maggie Pup: Hostile
15. Marigold: Neutral
16. Narr Neckbeard: Neutral
17. Og the Mot: Neutral
18. One-Two: Neutral
19. Piddling Pete: Neutral
20. Ponyboy: Neutral
21. Poxy / Sleazy: Neutral
22. Relioh: Neutral
23. Rubberlegs: Neutral
24. Shane McGowan: Uncooperative
25. Sours: Friendly
26. Slop / Wanks: Neutral
27. The Neck: Neutral
28. Three Teeth: Hostile
29. Ulk Big-Thumb: Neutral
30. Vorgrak the Voormi: Hostile

I'm doing a little leg work for a Savage Worlds conversion of SC-1 Perils of the Sunken City by +Jon Marr. Thanks to the G+ people, I now have an easy list of Extras to put through the funnel with the PC's. The idea is to get as much of the Savage Worlds system out in the open in stages as I can. Extras are a fun, and distinct feature of Savage Worlds, and the Extras that make it back alive with the party could become fixtures of the game.

If I wanted something closer to an actual funnel, I'd just give the players four chumps, and let them pick names from this list. I don't think the players in question are accustomed to that, so I'll probably have them build Novice level characters and throw them in with this bunch. The most important thing will be to throw in a quiet moment where they can talk about how they wound up in Mustertown's prison anyway...an interlude later in the dungeon to milk Bennies might serve that purpose. I'm actually thinking of starting the game "after" the group has been attacked by the opossum men and then "skipping back" to the start in a bit of a flashback, but that might be too fancy for me. We'll see.

Roll, or use any name that strikes your fancy, mark them off and write new ones in if you want to keep a living list of scum. Some are grouped to pair the list down to 30.x

2 to 4 per PC depending, they're designed to be fodder for the funnel. Flat d6 in everything. If a player takes a real interest in one, add D8 skill or to something implied by nickname. Nickname will imply personality unless you wish to roll for or invent one. Purple Sorcerer has a great little generator for 0-level that could throw up some inspiring info. +Ramanan S's generator could work too for quick ideas.

At least one extra should challenge the party for dominance, or try to turn on them at the first sign of loot, or balk at really freaky danger. This will let you go over Test of Wills. Extras will want armor, and weapons...will want to haggle over loot and shares. Extras take actions on controlling player's initiative card.

Savage Hall of Bones part 1

What follows is a re-counting of my on-the-fly conversion of Hall of Bones for my co-workers. I was asked about how the the OSR-style setup converted to Savage Worlds and wether or not the styles were mismatched. Its just reposted here on the blog to keep it from slipping away into the G+ stream. Theres a great bit of back and forth in the comments and you can find the original post here.

Anyway, the on the fly work I did is leading me to want to dual-stat things in SW and in LL / Swords & Wizardry...more about that later I believe. Here's my reply to Jack that turns into a re-cap & reflection on my GM style...which seems to be a position statement that is emerging form my time running, and playing lately:

+Jack Shear  I did my best to be a lazy GM and read the module bit by bit as they explored. I rounded out their party with a starting "healer" and "mage" from the template list in Deluxe. First thing I ran into was the dilapidated village, its got a map (as +Erik Jensen  points out) for very little reason. I think maybe I'll recycle that map for a combat above ground post-dungeon. The two players were very cautious, and Tork's player was enthusiastic and battled with being too cautious and being "the brick" but he did it with gusto. They explored and started running into a conversion problem (ie making good "notice" rolls but getting little information.) So I just began with surface details / obvious things and your roll would give you a second level of detail, and a raise would give you accurate information. I'm a big fan of +Courtney Campbell's work, so I kept trying to bounce the decisions back on them with some ideas, kept trying to summarize etc. though I'm not sure I'm super good at hewing faithfully to the ideal on that. (hey, its all practice right?) 

They ran into puzzles first, and since the fighter was ironically and sufficiently suspicious of the button he'd pressed they found the stair trap. He also set off the moldy room trap, but the other player was thinking quickly and dragged his sleeping form from the doorway pretty quickly. There was some great ham acting on his part and the two of them bantered with my two extras a lot, and had a good time. Since they thought to ask the "healer" and the "mage" about the mold after activating it they were able to get info on disabling it, and spent an "hour" with faces covered, burning out the mold with torches. They faced a bunch of "do you get discovered by dungeon monsters checks" and never had an encounter. They discovered the sanctuary room, beyond the mold trap and just before the end they faced down my re-skinned "ghouls" in the big, trashy ghoul den. I simply re-wrote "goblin" stats from the SWDX and gave them an extra power. Because they were super scared by the purple mold, I played that up in the description of the little, toothy dead-things with purple-ley patchy beards and body hair. I also doubled the number monsters in the room, and just gave the first two "surprise" THEN I had to react to the first initiative card dealt (a joker of course) to the Archer. So, I declared my actions, and then let him decide to interrupt or not. Then started the first round.

Rules I made up or may have mis-used:
Purple Mold: 
vigor -2 or fall asleep for 2d6 rounds; the end of the round you fall asleep it settles on you, colonizes and you make one more vigor check @ -2 save = fatigue, fail = 3d6 damage. If you're asleep then someone else has to take actions to help you, or the mold eats you. Mold continues to eat you every round as before.


Surprise:
Two ghouls in this room just get automatic surprise. Fine. If someone pulls a Joker, let them in on the first round before everyone else goes, then go in order of the initiative as the cards dictate.


"Groovie Ghoulies": (goblins by the SWDX)
These four-foot undead have been colonized by a strain of mold or fungus that grows on their bodies and so just add a paralyze to their attacks. Any shaken, or wound they cause also gives a Vigor check. Fail = lose actions (not very sexy, but its how I translated it on the fly) for 2d6 rounds. Second thoughts about these monsters is that they should have 2, maybe 3 attacks since they're basically fighting d6 and are not likely to hit the fighter's 6 parry. Then maybe rework the paralyze by going to look at other examples of paralyze in SW products. If they are "purple mold ghouls" you could just use a the Vigor vs Sleep rules from the mold entry I guess, but I was going quickly and thats just hindsight...

The combat was quick and they did well. I'm going to have to do some kind of work on the spell casters that makes them easier for me to use...ie I need to know the Power Points system better or give them a set number of spells or something...

All in all, I felt like it was Fast for what we were doing, and we definitely had fun, I'm not sure about Furious but I can include that later. This was pretty good for a ZERO prep game though.

Thats everything I've got on it right now. I plan to take some down time and actually prep some of the module so I'll report back on that if anyone is interested. I should also get out the NPC pdf and see what kinds of personalities the "healer" and the "mage" have...right now, its like a 4 person buddy cop movie in there...which is also good.

Re-skinning for fun, not profit.

This is just a personal statement about use of stats. In a similar vein to +Jack Shear's Just Use Bears. I'm posting it here as a challenge to myself, and to provide a LINK to understanding how I intend to use / reference stats for things I post here later.

Economy:
Don't spend hours and hours rolling, or building bad guys. Pick some stats from one of the following lists...maybe add a really important, distinct power that uses existing rules. What stats you use depend on what game you're playing. Making baddies tougher is easy. 

For D&D / S&W / LL, you simply add a hit die, or raise AC or both. Lots of times its much easier to pick a new stat block from a humanoid or something up the scale a step, and just describe it differently. NO NAMES, DAMNIT. Calling it a goblin ruins it. Let the players call it whatever they want...if a monster appears more than once, they will name it. 

In SW, you make a stat block tougher by bigger or smaller degrees through manipulation similar to D&D and the clones. Parry goes up when fighting goes up. Edges can make a stat block harder to hit, harder to wound etc. Don't re-invent the wheel. Use what works for you. Steal what you need and describe it differently.

In either system: Pick one thing. You won't remember more than that for each type / individual bad guy. Make sure it uses existing rules, don't re-write rules and stay away from obscure rules that never get used. Head towards the core of either system and just play.

Quirks:
I really like +Brendan S's house rules for the "Finchbox"game he's running. Borrowing his HD mechanic for NPC's / Monsters / Adversaries is a good idea. Your milage may vary, but it makes sense to me. Same for adopting a flat AC score, and removing bonuses. Although, I'd say that for a GM, having the HD demonstrate prowess in combat is a nice, simple mechanic...so a 3HD whatever might still have a +3 to hit, or hit as a Fighter lvl3 or what have you. Do what makes sense, anything else will atrophy in use because its not suited to your style. Steal stats from the LL Monster Matrix, and keep going. Use special monster that follow simple rules you know, or duplicate spell effects that you know. Add an attack, or a special power use in the same round as experience dictates. Establish your own Ascending AC reference, and then refer to it.

For SW I steal a lot of stats straight from the SWDX explorer's edition, and might tweak if I feel the need. Of the scads and scads of settings I have, there are lots of stat blocks to sift when I'm feeling like it. Also, you can raise or lower a die type pretty easily on the fly, figure out a Parry or Toughness score by comparison, and if you run SW you'll become familiar with the typical "buff" style special powers pretty quickly. Even just rolling a d6 and sending in more copies of the stat block you have on the table is a good one in SW. If they're not Wild Cards, they can ratchet tension and not really slow players down. Wild Cards have their own wounds, and chance to soak wounds so they really seem to freak the players out when they show up, or you declare their actions. Lastly, 

Skin Factories:
The early attempts to commodify me are very useful as skin factories because I know them well and I love them...Thundarr, He-Man, Scooby-Do and all those other shows whose theme songs I still have memorized...they are skin factories that I should be stealing plots, characters, and situations from every chance I get, or every time I'm not feeling creative.

Freebie Stats:
LL Monster Matrix
SW FREE Bestiary

'Ravenous'

Been waiting to add this one to my DVD collection for a while. Got a crummy copy at Half-Price for cheap. In tribute to Bob Carlyle, and Guy Pearce and all the rest: a SWDX imagining of a monster...

Windigo:
(As SWDX "bear" but with different Special Abilities)
Pace: 8; Parry: 6; Toughness: 10
Agility d6, Smarts d6 , Spirit d8, Strength d12+4, Vigor d12
Skills: Fighting d8, Notice d8, Swimming d6
Pace: 8; Parry: 6; Toughness: 10

Special Abilities:
Woodsman
Pick One, or for a really mean monster add as many as you like:
Frenzy, or Improved Frenzy
Hard to Kill, or Harder to Kill (build in a special story based way to kill 'em)
Killer Instinct
No Mercy  (though, I'd rather see you using the 'Blood and Guts' rules)

Hinderances, to taste
Big Mouth, Cannibal (Windigo love to talk about...y'know)
Bloodthirsty (A bit obvious?)
Delusions
Habit, Major
(might be a good way to do this, but the Vigor check is likely offset by 'bear' stats)
Vow (lets start a master-race!)

Rules Hack to replace 'Habit' / emulate the, "insatiable" thing if you like:
Use the 'Hunger' rules from p.99 but replace 'food' with 'human flesh.' This has the benefit of being in line with previous fatigue rules and is a minor change. The drawback is that you gotta know those rules. Doubling the requirement might be a nice tweak as well...no one but the GM is gonna give a crap though. I'd say roll a d3 to randomly determine how many 'fatigue' levels if you like...or be really mean and start them at full.

Pro Tip:
Give your Windigo a BA back story with a few possible variations so that they can blab it when they're first discovered. Ravenous is a great introduction on a few ways to play it. Or for a more random / monster of the week vibe, simply replace "bear" on your animal encounter table with "Windigo" I guess.

Hex Reassignment Surgery: Turf

I really like the free Blackmarsh stuff, and I've been trying to connect in a more intuitive way with the Blackmarsh map, so I went through Welsh Piper's ideas about turf and started dotting the map. This is a conceptual map for now, trying to show different types of influence, knowledge  and allegiance. Since this work is ultimately for trying out  +Jack Shear's gothic flavor I'm using the Blackmarsh map key as a basis to launch the re-skinning from.

I've used green to show areas that have a loyalty to the Church, are settled, and relatively safe. Yellow is for specific adventure sites and / or encounters that aren't always going to overlap with the Church's laws, goals, etc. Red, is mostly for monster-controlled territory or ranges, specifically dangerous sites, and anti-human or anti-church things.

The zones of influence suggest a lot to me at a glance: who might know what about things in the area; who you might bump into when you're out and about; where the secret / valuable stuff is; what kind of re-skinned monsters ought to go where. Zak had a post about zones a short time back too. For me, the coloring works as a way to get some better info at a glance. (In reality, I don't know what the "X" with superscript next to them are intended to mean...so I did this instead.)

Its not quite finished, but I've certainly gotten a better idea of the map and the map key overall than I had before. Welsh Piper's thoughts about world building, turf, and letting random tables guide the wilderness exploration experience have produced some interesting results. I've not added all the overlapping territories yet, as I wanted to focus on the areas around Blackmarsh Castle to get a better idea what starting characters near there might face. If you're checking my work, you'll note that I didn't really fill in some of the full "ranges" suggested by the size of some of the encounter monsters...thats because I was in a hurry and more interested in settlements and the like.

With any luck, I'll be able to figure out a way to tag a PDF version of this map with "stickies" or annotations that I can simply click on during a session to get a bit of detail of each 5 mile hex. Then, maybe add some custom encounter tables for zones, and BAM...its all over but the treasure rolls...right?

A work in progress: Combining info from the Blackmarsh Hex key and Welsh Piper's Thoughts on Turf.

Hex Reassignment Surgery: Humanoids, assembled!

Right now I'm still reading the Blackmarsh hex list. It's interesting to note that the material looks pretty sandbox-y to me on the surface, but actually has some story baked right in.

Today I'm looking at races and making notes on how to use them. Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque takes an approach that I think is interesting:

"Since my campaign setting is humans-only for the player characters, I tend to associate each human-like race with a fear linked to the human condition; that is, each demi-human race represents some problematic aspect of mankind that we like to pretend doesn't exist."

So, I'm making a list of things that will help me keep towards the uncanny side of demi-humans. Its intended to be a kind of quick-n-dirty reference to remind me what I'm aiming for when I use or re-skin demi-humans from the Blackmarsh source. I intend to "lump" some of these together and so they are listed together.

Dwarves: the fear of Avarice

Dwarves should always have a price. One that is high, strange, and inflexible. Dwarves should always have the most unique gear and / or services that can be crafted and bought. Dwarves will always insist on being paid in the clearest of terms. They should be blunt to the point of rudeness about what they will and won't do; do and don't want etc. Dwarves should also behave as though their greed is normal. They will expect those they interact with to have a price, and will want to know what that is. Graft and nepotism are expected...then you'd want to run their societies kind of Roman. Patrons, and favors and bribes, and obsessions. They might be kind of Hanseatic, or Mafioso...I'm not sure. The entire race should be in some sort of protracted war against another non-human race over a failure to pay a debt. These are the folk who created the idea of interest as a thing that accumulates, they may have invented money too.

Drow, Eladrin & Elves:  fear of Decadence, Alien-ness, & Chaos

My first lumped group, and one of the more problematic demi-human races for me personally. I don't really like fantasy elves of any stripe, its just a problem I have. I like that Jack has removed the color coding from his elves, so I'm keeping that and renaming them all Faeries until I come up with something better. Every Elf, Nixie, Sprite, and Mermaid in the Backmarsh source needs to be filtered as I go. That shouldn't be hard to do because one of the stories baked into the setting has to do with Elves and where they stand on the idea that they have the right to govern the other races. That can be spun in a gothic way, right?

Where you find a Faerie will tell you a lot about them. If they are rustic, they might be Elves; urbane and social, possibly Drow; aloof and hermit-like...maybe Eladrin. Fey should have a modestly knowable set of logical operators. They should keep their word (perhaps strictly), have long memories, and have a hard time relating to shorter-lived races. They should not use magic, but rather be magical. They should distribute boons and curses frequently per the TotGaD source.

My list from before applies here. Making them weird and unique will be necessary as they have a large part of the Blackmarsh back story, and I might get bored with them if I don't lean into the challenge.

Giants, Trolls, & Ogres fear of inebriation, the abject, & cannibalism

Two words for you...Troll Hunter. There is plenty of swamp in Blackmarsh and plenty of Trolls in the TotGaD Compendiums. A broad selection of Troll-ish goodness lets me have good, old-fashioned monster fun times. I like that Jack gives Trolls a kind of antipathy. Their nearness assaults the mind and drives out reason. They curdle milk, and pollute clear streams of water. They rage through the countryside and consume mass quantities. If they do talk, they talk of the greatest meals they've ever had (or the bravest people, or the most valuable item) and may be goaded and tricked easily. This includes Hags though, too so don't get too triumphant there, Finn McCool.

Gnolls: fear of Animality

Maybe it was all the He-Man and Thundercats in my early days, but Hyena / Jackal dudes are completely rad. They should attack in packs, have alphas, and be red in tooth and claw. Anytime you start to put a wolf encounter in, change it to a Gnoll encounter instead. Gnolls are often linked to slaving in D&D...who are they taking people to? They don't keep them.

Gnomes: fear of the Unheimlich

If used correctly, the players should assume the Gnome in question is a kind of representation of Satan. Maybe there's only The Gnome, and it serves some similar cosmological role as the adversary / tempter. Rows and rows of shark-like teeth is a great image to use to startle and disarm. They should offer great power at a terrible price, or seemingly easy solutions to tough problems.

Goblins & Kobolds: fear of science run amok & misrule

Basically Gremlins. They should spawn like crazy, die in droves and be mostly reptilian...keep the "dog head" for extra strangeness if you like. Should be known for eating the flesh of Humans, diabolically-trapped warrens, dangerous war machines, weird magical automatons (made of what: wood? bronze?), and unexpected explosions. Their leaders should be a major cut above, with ageless shamans and wizards maintaining enough organization to keep the Man-flesh supply steady. Goblin as a name has a lot of baggage attached to it for me, so I will probably use Kobold in its place. "Kobolds ate my baby!"

Halflings: fear of place

What happens to a Human when they have no hope? What does it look like when they succumb to the mundanity of life? Hobbits. Thats the answer. Over time, Humans can literally shrink as their spirit of independence withers and they become a caricature of the free-willed individual they were once. Halflings, are therefore mundane in every outward aspect and sinister in every interior manner. Interactions with them should be a kind of "hey this could be you, if you'd settled down and started pig farming..." or "Damn, down-and-out is really down and out..."They might be used as a kind of house-fairy analogue as well...the ones you leave little gifts for in hopes they don't ruin your life. They should certainly be a kind of gleeful parasite on human societies.

Orcs: fear of savagery

Bred for war, but by whom? Everywhere you find a Faerie who does not want to get its hands dirty, or whatever...there will be an Orc. Guards, brutes & enforcers. Orcs without masters leave the "civilized" areas and wind up with even more sinister masters. TotGaD has them listed as a created race, so there may not be any sexual dimorphism. Being created raises lots of interesting questions. How do you control them? Can they be commanded to do anything other than delight in savagery? What vile rituals and ingredients come together to create them? 

Tieflings: fear of racial degeneration

Caliban & Half-bloods. Interbreeding rarely goes well, and there are dark, corrupting forces out there everywhere. Curses, diabolic-pacts, and magical mutations are just a few ways you could wind up with a messed up humanoid. I personally don't like Tieflings (see Elves above) so I wont be using them in the strictest sense. Maybe some cultists and sorcerers have to hide their forked tongues, and file their horns down...thats fine. What I'm thinking of is more along the lines of Mike's Half-Elves. Setting aside the willfully mutated, I want some slice of half-blooded freaks to be victims, or innocents. That might be too Quasimodo...I don't know.

That's everything I have that overlaps between what I want in the game, whats in Blackmarsh, and what Jack has written. I'm resisting the urge to kitchen sink a whole bunch more monsters. Snake-men, for example, make an appearance in any game that I run (...too much V: The Final Battle for me as a kid...) My counter-argument to myself being that any more 'monsters' should be unique rather than assumed as a 'species' ... which serves my ethic of trying to fight the Vanilla Fantasy Creep.

~IMCTT

Hex Reassignment Surgery: Backmarsh, meet The World Between

Deciding where I wanted to pull my ideas from for this mash-up / re-skin was pretty easy. I've been reading +Jack Shear's Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque compendiums for a couple of weeks now. I am really enjoying them as gaming materials and academic primers on the subject of gothic literature. Reading them, and trying to understand 'how-to: Gothic' has been fun and challenging. I'm finding that in my attempts to wrap my head around the materials that I'm able to prevent some of my own, vanilla fantasy assumptions from being so automatic.

The Swords & Wizardry SRD has all the marks of a labor of love, and like its bigger cousin the Pathfinder SRD I love that its online, and easy to get to. When I saw the Blackmarsh Campaign Setting described as an example for newer GM's to follow, I decided I wanted to take the time to try and understand it. Hex-mapped campaign settings are not really in my background as a gamer; I was rarely able to afford game books growing up, and I didn't take the time to really appreciate the technical side of game books until much more recently. So, hex-mapping is pretty much "all-new" to me.

Having read most of the TotGaD companions a couple of times now, I can tell that while I'm going to aspire to be as "Gothic" as I can manage while re-skinning this, I don't think I will manage to be as faithful to the inspirational materials as I want to be. That's pretty okay with me in the context of trying it out though. I'm not writing any papers for Jack's class so I should be okay. The exciting thing for me is going to be using his material as a way to stretch my GM repertoire and try to put a clear "fingerprint" on this basic campaign setting. Due to my own personal tastes I may wind up with something more Alex Toth than Edgar Allan Poe, but I will have made an honest attempt.

I want to read Blackmarsh through a couple of more times before starting, in earnest with the re-skin and hex reassignment, but here are some of the ideas I've got forming currently on the big picture side:

Blackmarsh vocabulary changes:
We have GOT to get rid of 'Viz' as a name. I can't take it...I keep flashing back to the Coo Coo Cola Cult episode of Rescue Rangers. I'd rather call it Magicite, or Manna. Quintessence has the right sort of feel to it, but seems less "does what it says, says what it does" than Manna. Even blood stone, star metal, or ghost rock would be better. So, Viz is gone and Manna is in for now. I want to reserve Jack's 'demonstone' for later.

So, Manna is a thing in this setting. A discreet unit of magical quintessence that allows a magic user to cast a spell, but retain it in memory. This works on a 1:1 ratio of Manna to Spell Level. So, you can burn 1 Manna and keep a Level 1 spell in memory; 2 Manna for a Level 2 spell etc. Also, 1 Manna is equivalent to 100 GP for making magic items.

That's pretty cool, right? It makes Manna a fantasy-style gold-rush kind of resource. The problem now is that I'm reading that Manna (Viz) is both a discreet unit and some kind of interestingly unique snow-flake resource. The setting has some indications that it can be any number of amazing forms: "a flask of pure spring water, a newly bloomed flower, or an iridescent rock" while simultaneously, the sand-box has locations with artefacts that have places where "Viz can be inserted." So I'm going to want to clean that up. Hopefully without rules / too many rules. The questions that arise immediately for me are "where are the Manna pools?" or "how can I make that game-able?"

What I'm thinking right now is that Manna can be caught, and crystalized somehow to make it a unit. With some skill, this could tie into the gothic 'grandeur of nature' thing and maybe even cast an eye towards Reason vs Supernaturalism...I'm not sure yet.

Gothic themes and window dressing:
Feyan Folk, Elves, Eladrin, Drow and fairies of the D&D description are a bit whimsical for the inspirational material. Making Elves weird is going to be hard for me in actual play, so I'm going to want to set them up well in my head. That means narrowing the field and changing some designations and really trying to use Elves for something other than 'High Men' or whatnot. (I will not take 'Ancient Astronauts' off the table.) So I want to lump Elves, Eladrin, and Drow as concepts into something more compact. I think I want use them to highlight the fears as indicated in the Compendium...I just don't want to make a major kind of distinction between them. I think I'll have an easier time emphasizing the subtleties at the table if I keep them together in one slot in my head.

I will want to think deeply about the cultural rules that allow Men and Feyan (or whatever I'll call them eventually) to interact. In Blackmarsh, as in Tolkien, the Elves are the shepherds of civilization but on the wane...I'll want to address that in particular rather than assume it. Bake it into the setting as a feature not a bug. Keeping them weird will require some anthropological raiding for strange customs and the like.

Weird ideas about individuality, property, and modesty
roles as names "Puck" "Alder King"
bound by certain kinds of agreements
morbidly fascinated by mortality in short-lived sentients
a comment on class / colonialism
problems with intensity or exposure to human emotionality makes ruling humans complex
have a 'veiled countenance' and 'unveiled' wich is hard on other sapients

Monsters are going to get lumped a little too. I want Trolls that are Giants, and want to call them Trolls ala 'Troll Hunter' with a lot of various breeds. There are Troll tables for that. Gnolls are definitely in because of the 'Grand Guignolls' and my love of animal-dudes. There's plenty of swamp, but I don't know what kind of D&D swamp denizens I want. I do want Goblins as Gremlins, and maybe Kobolds can be my swamp guys. They eat humans and are devious so they hit some classic Degenerate Hillbilly notes with a lot less of the classist implications I see with Ogres and Voodoo Halflings. If I have Orcs, I may use them as created enforcers for the Elves...

Thats it for now. Feel free to sound off on some of this if you have the notion.

~IMCTT

Hex Reassignment Surgery: Getting Started

Okay, I want to learn something about hexes and stocking them. I've been doing the reading, and being the lazy sort that I am...I intend to re-purpose, re-skin, and borrow wholesale from wherever I can. The purpose is to learn something about what kinds of building and randomization tools I work best with. That means its time for Hex Reassignment Surgery!

Rule #1: Free is for me

If its not free, with some sort of fairly-clear intent of free use attached its not going to be used.

Rule #2: Re-skin-spiration!

There are a ton of awesome, random generators and free ideas out there...try to use them to good effect.

Rule #3: Less is more

Just a reminder to keep the representations light so more people can use them.

Basic Ingredients: 

Blackmarsh Campaign Setting @ Swords & Wizardry SRD

Labyrinth Lord by Goblinoid Games

Labyrinth Lord rules in wiki format

Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque by Jack W. Shear
The Grim, Gritty, and Strange world of Hubris by Mike Evans

Hex-Stocking Theory:

Untimately: Hex Stocking

Jeff's Gameblog: Wilderness Stocking

The Welsh Piper: Worldbuilding

The Alexandrian: Hexcrawl

Miscellaneous Inspiration & Resources:

Save vs Total Party Kill ~ awesome web apps

truculent.org ~ Labyrinth Lord Character Generator

Secret Santicore 2011

Zak's Orientation Essays

Sham's Grog n Blog: Distribution of Monsters and Treasure

Links to Wisdom ~ Preparing and Running the Game

Damn, that's a lot to contemplate! Next time, the Elevator Pitch, and some re-defining of the basic Blackmarsh lingo to suit my desire.

~IMCTT