Update !

Ces derniers temps, je n'ai pas de temps à consacrer à mon blog. Mais je reviendrais très prochainement avec je l'espère plein d'idées extravagantes !
Au plaisir.

***

Lately, I do not have enough time to devote to my blog. But I would return very soon !
See you, guys.

[Carcosa] Angular Shapeshifter

Angular Shapeshifter. # Appearing: 1; AC 9; Move 9/12; HD 15; % in Lair: 99%; Treasure: Nil.

The Non-Euclidean Formulas: This five-hour ritual will conjure the Angular Shapeshifter. The sorcerer must perform the ritual while writing hermetic calculations on the tanned skinned of five Bone Men flayed with an obsidian knife whose knob is set with a red opal worth at least 2,000 gp. As the ritual is completed, the sorcerer must ignite the skins with Greek fire. Then the Angular Shapeshifter will appear. 

The Fifty-fourth Dark Theorem: This ritual takes 5 minutes to complete. At the end of the recitation, the sorcerer must attract the Angular Shapeshifter in a pool filled with honey. Once it is fully submerged, the Angular Shapeshifter will return to the interstellar void.

Sublimation of the Highest Dimension: This one-hour ritual can be performed only during a total solar eclipse in the Icy Wastes. The sorcerer, the face smeared with the blood of a throat cut Jale child, must fire a Neodymium ray towards the Sun. At the ritual’s end, the Angular Shapeshifter will obey the sorcerer at daytime until the next solar eclipse.

The Spherical Perfection: To complete this twenty-minute ritual, the sorcerer must be at the center of a circle formed by the skulls of seven sorcerers he defied and killed on top of which he has placed seven candles made ​​with grease levied on Green virgins. The candles then burn for twenty minutes whereafter the Angular Shapeshifter is trapped in the molten core of Carcosa. But if a candle burns too fast, too slow or turns off the sorcerer spontaneously ignites and melts like a candle, slowly drying out in atrocious suffering.

Obliteration of the Null Polytope: This nine-hour ritual can be performed only in hex 0808 in the largest crater of a very old volcano. There, the sorcerer must cast five blind and albino Dolm men in the fiery pit as he psalmody mysterious formulas.He must then pour three ounces of virgin quicksilver (collected in a basin of hex 0204) in the lava. During the ritual, the volcano will erupt while the Angular Shapeshifter, buried deep in the liquid core of Carsosa, struggles, plagued with unspeakable torments. At the ritual’s end, the Angular Shapeshifter will be bound to the sorcerer’s will for the next solar year.

[Carcosa] Angular Shapeshifter

ANGULAR SHAPESHIFTER : Above the planet Carcosa, floating in the interstellar void is an impossible polyhedron. One can not say if it is convex or concave. It escapes all qualifiers, or rather deserves them all : it regular and irregular, isotoxal and uniform, semi-regular and quasi-regular, ordered and disordered : it is the purest manifestation of the chaotic law. It is constantly changing, losing faces, building others. The only thing for sure about this entity is that it is evil, sentient and terribly cold (its black surface is covered by cosmic frost). In combat, the Angular Shapeshifter drains 1D energy levels by succesful hit.  

Psionics: 1-3 powers up to three times per day

to conjure: The Non-Euclidean Formulas
to banish: The Fifty-fourth Dark Theorem
to bind: Sublimation of the Highest Dimension
to imprison: The Spherical Perfection
to torment: Obliteration of the Null Polytope

Magic Items and Creativity !

It is often hard to create magic items strange or original enough to surprise your players.
So here is a tip to get there, while restoring the incomprehensible side of magic : naming the object before describing it! Therefore, we can ask us : how can we name well a magic item ? 
And the answer is: rely upon abstruse and cryptic words...

Naming a magic item :
Step 1 : roll a d10. 
1. [Name]'s [Adjective] [Noun]
2. [Adjective] [Noun]
3. [Adjective] [Noun] of [Effect]
4. [Adjective] [Adjective] [Noun]
5. [Name]'s [Adjective] [Noun] of [Effect]
6. [Adjective] [Noun] of [Adjective] [Effect]
7. [Name]'s [Adjective] [Noun] of [Adjective] [Effect]
8. [Adjective] [Adjective] [Noun] of [Effect]
9. [Adjective] [Noun] of [Effect] and [Effect]
10. [Noun] of [Effect] and [Adjective] [Effect]

Step 2 : Choose or randomly determine each element of the name so that it is disturbing or difficult to understand. 
Adjectives 

Step 3 : Deduct / invent the history and the properties of the magic item based on its name.

Example : 
Thurgal's Acescent Potion of Evanescence is a suntail liquid that looks harmless as you do not drink it. If one identifies it magically, it seems to be a potion of teleportation. However, if you ingest it, it immediately turns in acid (1d6 damage per round, no saving throw) and makes you invisible (no saving throw) !
Thurgal was a sorcerer and a courtier who wanted to poison the Undying Sultan of Aarthal. To do this, he created a particularly vicious acid with many interesting properties. Unfortunately, he was captured before committing his crime and quartered in the public square. It is said that recipe was lost ... but is this really the case?

Nothing prevents you to do so with unique creatures and spells ! 

Supplement II : Blackmoor - Temple of the Frog - Background

J'ai peu de temps en ce moment pour bloguer, aussi je découperais ce post en plusieurs parties faute de temps pour toutes les rédiger en une fois.

Commençons donc avec la trame de fond.
"Deep in the primaeval swamps of Lake Gloomey" notez le "primaeval" (=primitif). De un, cela rappelle bien sûr les dinosaures préhistoriques dont j'ai parlé dans un post précédent, et de deux, il serait difficile de ne pas faire le rapprochement avec ce post de excellente série de Wayne Rossi sur l'univers impliqué de OD&D. Blackmoor prend de plus en plus d'allures de Lost World.
"Combining the natural animals available with each other — through the use of biological mutations and methods discovered in old manuscripts — the Brothers began developing the giant killer frogs of the swamp." Inutile de commenter une énième fois cette fascination de Dave Arneson pour les grenouilles géantes (c'est sans aucun doute lui qui en a fait un monstre emblématique de D&D), le titre de ce module est déjà assez parlant. Ce choix d'un amphibien est assez révélateur : voici un autre monstre du fond des âges, lié autant aux monstres marins qu'aux reptiles. La grenouille est vraiment un animal qui gagne à se faire grosse comme un boeuf, contrairement à ce que suggère le très connu fabuliste ! Plus intéressant encore est la mention de mutations biologiques découvertes dans de vieux manuscrits : voilà qui est contradictoire. Les manipulations biologiques (déjà assez intrigantes telles quelles) demandent des connaissances à coté de laquelle l'imprimerie est un jeu d'enfant. Pourquoi alors des manuscrits ? Cet antique savoir a du être développé par des civilisations ou des races disparues depuis des éons, sans doute les mêmes qui sont à l'origine de la Cité des Dieux et des objets technologiques de Blackmoor. Leurs écrits originaux se sont perdus (peut-être en subsiste t-il quelques-uns, rares, très chers et indéchiffrables même aux meilleurs linguistes - qu'en est-il de lecture des langages ?) et seuls subsistent les traductions manuscrites de traductions précédentes etc. Un peu à la manière des grimoires du Mythe de Cthulhu, pour tracer un parallèle. Revenons à cette étrange science des manipulations génétiques. Elle ouvre des possibilités immenses : la science avancée revient-elle à de la magie magnifiée purifiée de tout ésotérisme ? quelle était cette antique civilisation (ses buts, son apparence etc.) ? pourquoi a t-elle "disparu" (exil, cataclysme, extinction, guerre...) ? quelles ont été les créations de ces biologistes de génie ? les monstres ? les dinosaures ? l'Homme ("a biological abomination which would ultimately threaten the existence of all life" selon la secte de la grenouille) ? toute vie ? La question vertigineuse de la Genèse de Blackmoor, en quelque sorte, et une source intarissable d'aventures en tous genres.

To be continued...

[Making a Fantasy Sandbox] D3 - Vault of the Drow | Part 1

1. Pick an area roughly 200 miles by 150 miles
2. Grab a 8.5 by 11 sheet of hex paper.
3. The scale should be so that it represents a 200 by 150 mile region
4. Draw in mountains
5. Draw in rivers
6. Draw in hills using them to divide the region into distinct river valley
7. Draw in vegetation (swamps, forests, desert, etc)

To serve as sandbox, Vault of the Drow is far too small (6x6 miles). I want to increase the size of hexagones from 240 yards to 1 mile. This is a huge increase (x7,3) which will radically change the scaling of adventures in D3. 


We will see later if it is suitable: it will always be time to change.  
So this is the new map of Vault of the Drow (note that the city and the temple were significantly decreased in terms of size). I did not try to stick strictly to the original (too tedious, but the locations and shapes are the same).

PS : I did not specified it in the original post, but I will also convert characteristics from AD&D to OD&D.

Any suggestions/comments ?  

Click to enlarge.

[Making a Fantasy Sandbox] D3 - Vault of the Drow

There is no need to brag for the umpteenth time the module D3 : those who read this blog are as much aware of this fact as me.
However, one can see a lot of people asking : "What the characters are supposed to do in this module?". Asking this question amounts to miss the main interest of Vault of the Drow. Why ?
BECAUSE D3 IS A FANTASY SANDBOX!
Although this isn't an earth-shaking revelation, it's worth repeating.
  
So, what's the purpose of this post?
Vault of the Drow is in the top 5 of my favorite modules, and thereby I am toying with the idea of finally playing it.

Yet it is clear that D3 is not a ready-to-play module. It needs to be expanded and reworked with love by the referee, and this is even more the case if one wishes to play it as a sandbox. So this message began a series of posts in which I will try to extend D3 to make it playable without prior preparation by the DM, while still maintaining a minimalist style leaving any latitude to the environment to be changed during play. 

I will try to follow the 34 steps of the method created by the brilliant Rob Conley on his Bat in the Attic blog. 

1. Using one page sketch a world or continent map
2. Label important regions
3. Write one page of background giving no more than a handful of sentences to each region.
4. Pick an area roughly 200 miles by 150 miles
5. Grab a 8.5 by 11 sheet of hex paper.
6. The scale should be so that it represents a 200 by 150 mile region
7. Draw in mountains
8. Draw in rivers
9. Draw in hills using them to divide the region into distinct river valley
10. Draw in vegetation (swamps, forests, desert, etc)
11. Decide to place Population Locales note their race this includes social monsters
12. Decide to place Lairs (locales tht revolves around a home of monsters)
13. Decide to place Ruins (locales that revolves around a site)
14. Decide to place miscellaneous locales. (anything that doesn't fit a above.
15. Name your geography (don't forget islands)
16. Write a Half Page background describing the region and it's history.
17. Write a paragraph describing each named geography
18. Write a paragraph describing each Population Locale
19. Write a paragraph describing each Lair (you could get away with a stat block)
20. Write a paragraph describing each Ruin
21. Look at your notes and come up with two to four plots that ties one or more locales together. Write a paragraph or two on each.
22. For each population locale come up with three to five encounters. They should be a sentence each.
23. Come up with 6 to 12 general encounter for the region as a whole. Should usable in any area of the region. They are a sentence or two each.
24. Pick the 4 or 6 most important Population locales and draw a quarter page sketch map of the settlement.
25. Pick the starting population locale and draw a full page map of the settlement. This is the "Home Base"
26. Use Medieval Demographics to get an a idea of how many shops are in the town.
27. Pick or create 6 or 12 important buildings. Write a paragraph each.
28. Scan your descriptions for NPCs or noted monsters. Write a two sentence about each. The first a one line with minimal stats the second one sentence. This is your roster.
29. Pick the 12 most important NPC or Monsters
30. Write a paragraph describing each and fully stat them.
31. Pick the most six common encounter type. (City Guard, Border Warders, Bloody Hand, Orcs) Write a paragraph and fully stat them.
32. Scan your description for any regional organization and write a paragraph on them. Fully stat the most common encounters involved with them.
33. Make up a rumor chart with 10 to 20 items that feeds the players into the encounter and plots you created in above.
34. Identify major regions and create a random encounter chart for each (monsters, wildlife and NPCs).