Author: Bearded-Devil Page 3 of 13

Gossamer is now half complete, with the Withered Quarter – the section of Gossamer which lies in Annwn, realm of eternal winter and land of the dead, ruled by the dread Arawn – now looming brumous and frostbitten east of the Wilting Quarter.

Link to a more detailed image.

Crookhollow

The sinister little village of Crookhollow is a settlement of woodwoses, a rare colony of mortals in Elfhame. Once denizens of the Gnarl, these woodwoses are unusually settled, unlike their nomadic kindred of the deep woods. The wildmen are worshippers of Arawn, lord of the dead, and practice regular sacrifices by fire, setting ablaze vast effigies containing captive enemies – often mortals kidnapped from the woods at the borderlands of Faerie. Such burnt offerings ensure a place of honour for the denizens of Crookhollow when they die, as they shrug off their rude hides and furs for the resplendant finery of the elfin dead, joining the Fair Folk in their subterannean palaces of stone to live afterlives of langour and gloomy opulence.

Drakesworth

Before Gossamer sprawled to its present size, the district now known as Drakesworth was a barren country shadowed by a dark crag, lair of the horror known as Svafnir, a dragon said to hail from the giant-world of Jotunheim. This monster, naturally, possessed a vast hoard of treasure, and slew all who tried to plunder his trove. The beast, however, had grown somewhat lazy over the long years, spending much of its time dreaming of its lost homeland on its bed of gold, and over time the city spread nearly to its doorstep. Eventually, the Fair Folk struck a deal with the dragon – rather than sending in an endless series of hopeless champions to slay Svafnir or steal its treasures, they would simply borrow from the hoard, repaying what they took with interest. Though initially sceptical, the dragon was intrigued. Thus the Hoardsbank was founded: now the foremost financial institution in Elfhame, the size of its assets having increased many hundreds of times over since its founding. Tunnels wind endlessly into the earth, filled with the gold earned by the bank, while Svafnir has recovered somewhat from his planesickness, taking to his new life as a moneylending wyrm. Some whisper that the dragon is the true master of the Withered Quarter, having grown far richer even the the Horned King. Whatever the case, Drakesworth is now one of the most salubrious districts in all of Gossamer, filled with fine buildings of stone and marble, the offices of much of the city’s professional class. Also within Drakesworth is the Temple of the Royal Sepulchre, resting place of the Royal Family of Elfhame. Here can be found the shades of the former monarchs of Faerie, resting after their centuries of rule, dispensing wisdom to heroes of renown and Faerie’s present rulers.

The Gnarl

Though currently in a state of uneasy peace, Annwn and Tír na nÓg have not always been so. During the War of the Trees, Annwn launched an invasion of Tír na nÓg, and Gossamer – usually neutral even during conflicts – became a battleground. After Queen Titania’s armies drove the Shade-Horde back into the Winter Realm, she launched a counterattack, calling on the forest itself to rise to her banner. Thousands of treefolk marched at the behest of the Queen of Flowers, invading Annwn. In Gossamer, this incursion was turned back at the Gullet and the central canal, but for all their efforts, the armies of Arawn were unable to fully repel the treefolk invaders. Thus the southern edge of the Withered Quarter has become the Gnarl: a sprawling wood in the heart of the city, full of twisting, labyrinthine paths, mossgrown ruins, and secret glades. Though most of the treefolk have since fallen back into slumber, some still stand sentinel against any future invasion, including their general, Grandfather Yew. Rangers sworn to Titania’s service, known as the Petal Guard, also patrol the shifting trails and lurk in wait should intruders seek entrance to the Blooming Quarter without leave. Within the depths of the woods it is said one can also find the tower of Myrddin, a mortal mage native to the wizardly city of Hex, whose manse has many doors and many manifestations, and whose knowledge of matters arcane rivals even that of the Fair Folk themselves.

The Grimdowns

On the surface, the misty mounds of the Grimdowns seem but a few snowy crags, topped with the tomb-markers of the dead. In fact, the district is by far the most populous in all of Gossamer, for each and every mound leads down into the grand Necropolis of the city, a seemingly infinite warren that sprawls throughout the Withered Quarter, deep into the earth, filled with the uncountable souls of the dead. All who die in Elfhame manifest as shades in Annwn, and many come here to the Withered Quarter for at least some of their endless days and nights. Despite its vastness, however, the Necropolis is a quiet, dusty place, for the shades lack the energy of life – without the thought of their own deaths motivating them, most shades are slow, contented beings, either tranquil or melancholic, mere echoes of their previous selves. Entry into the catacombs of the Necropolis is granted only to the dead; the living may visit the tombs and leave offerings, even trading certain objects with the dead, but they may not walk the unending tunnels or gaze on the subterannean wonders of the city of the dead that lies beneath their feet.

The Gullet

Before the realm of Annwn was ruled by the Dread Lord Arawn, the Horned King, it had a different sovereign: the dark being known as Crom Cruach, the Head of the Mound, the Devouring Worm, an entity said to be one of Chthonic Gods, demon-princes of the Netherworld, and rumoured to be brother of the Charnel Goddess Mordiggia. Crom Cruach’s rule ended many centuries ago during the reign of High Queen Nicnevan, when he was sealed deep in the bowels of the earth, buried alive by the Elves. Despite his defeat, however, Crom Cruach is still worshipped in the Withered Quarter by a small coterie of cambions, half-elfin and half-demon cultists. The Cult controls the district of the Withered Quarter known as the Gullet, whose buildings are older than almost any in Gossamer – warped and twisted into quasi-organic forms, their very stones seem to grow and reshape themselves like living things. Though the Cult of Crom Cruach acknowledge the sovereignty of Arawn, they keep their own laws and customs, and have been known to bicker with the neighbouring folk of Crookhollow, sometimes snatching woodwoses who stray too near to the tenebrous avenues of their fell domain.

Howling

Rising above the Grimdowns is the dark castle of Caer Sidi, fortress and home of the Dread Lord Arawn himself, Horned King of Annwn. Carved from never-thawing ice, this grim citadel has never been taken in war, manned by an unblinking garrison of the dead, the formidible revenant-warriors known as the Cauldron-Born, who were raised many centuries past by the Sacred Cauldron, one of the legendary Thirteen Treasures of Elfhame. The area around the castle is known as Howling, for it perpetually echoes with the bestial voices of the Cŵn Annwn, wraith-hounds of Arawn, who form part of the legendary Wild Hunt, which, as part of the terms of the peace with Hell, returns souls from the Netherworld who escape the bounds of Hell for Faerie or the mortal realm. Some claim that those who hear their fell voices lose a year of their allotted lifespan.

The Sty

Enclave of ogres, trolls, and their half-mortal kindred, the Sty is a ramshackle sprawl clustered on the western edge of the Withered Quarter, and one of the poorer districts in Gossamer. The district is named for the hogs raised and slaughtered in the abbatoirs here, chief industry of the neighbourhood. A rare few such swine are not killed, for all pigs are first subjected to tests when they are young to determine whether they possess oracular abilities; hogs born in the Withered Quarter, here at the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead, can sometimes exhibit divinatory power. Such beasts can prophesy the weal or woe of many things, and upon dying their entrails and bladders are inspected by the district’s sage haruspexes and choriomancers to discern secrets of great import. Also of note in the Sty is the gigantic mead-hall known as The Golden Hog, a gilded statue which some claim is in fact a petrified dire boar from Jotunheim; though a rough and tumble place, its feasts are the stuff of legend. Those who venture into the Sty are advised to go armed and in groups after dark, for bands of unsavoury giantkin such as the Needleteeth, the Rednails, and the Gutprickers roam the shadowed alleys at night and are rumoured to snatch the odd visitor for their stew-pots; separating the truth of such rumours from anti-troll prejudices is difficult, but certainly the neighbourhood has been the site of many blood-feuds and street-brawls.

Building Gossamer, Part 4 – The Wilting Quarter

By Bearded-Devil

On August 7, 2020

In Roleplaying

After a couple of months of sporadic work, the Wilting Quarter is now complete, making Gossamer 25% done. Next up will be the Withered Quarter, Arawn’s domain, the wintry section of the city directly east of the Wilting Quarter, across the osseous Spinebridge. In upcoming posts, I’ll also be detailing how I populate districts with additional details; below is just a rough outline of the major landmarks and purpose of each neighbourhood.

Link to a more detailed image.

The Wilting Quarter is the section of the city ruled by Queen Mab, the Autumnal Sovereign, and thus lies in the realm of Logris. Its districts are dedicated to pleasures and skullduggery, dark delights and forbidden knowledge. Practices the Seelie Court find unsavoury can be celebrated openly in the Wilted Quarter; the laws are few and enforced but rarely by the Queen’s rancid guards, with most disputes being settled with jocular duels which become yet another form of public entertainment.

The Brambles

Originally grown as a defensive fortification to repel invaders from Mag Mell, the Brambles have become a den of iniquity and vice. Poisons are openly bought and sold throughout the district, most notably from the garden of Caprice the witch, which sprawls at the neighbourhood’s pungent heart – a verdant grove of hemlock and nightshade. Blades for hire and assassins can also be found throughout the Brambles, including the near-mythic Nettles, an ancient guild of professional killers whose opulent, temple-like headquarters lies just a few blocks east of the imposing towers of the Thorn Gate. Most infamous of the Nettles are the twin sprite assassins Hellebore and Belladonna, known for such gruesome escapades as the Pigeon Pie Massacre, in which the pair hid themselves in the hollowed-out ceremonial pigeon pie at a banquet in Mag Mell, only to spring from the crust and slay half a dozen elfin nobles before the wine was poured.

Goblin Town

As a rule, the Fair Folk shun most modern technology, scorning the steam-engines and clockwork used by mortals. Goblins, however, are a notable exception, and their shambolic ghetto in the midst of the Wilted Quarter is a seething, stinking swelter of acrid smoke and hissing machines. Though far short of the industrial capacity of cities like Hex and Erubescence, the factories of Goblin Town churn out all manner of strange devices, from repeating crossbows to fireworks to crude pistols to mechanical traps to clockwork toys. Many of these are built from scrap metal and other oddments salvaged from the junkyard in the southern part of the district, the city’s garbage-tip for inorganic waste. The west side of Goblin Town also features a number of fighting pits and monster-gardens, populated with creatures from the wilds of Elfhame and beyond; many such creaturea are bought and sold in the Beast Market.

Grosscastle

The Fomorians used to number among Mab’s favoured peoples: giants, originally hostages in the Enormity Wars between Elfhame and Jotunheim, become the soldiers and servants of the Unseelie Court. They lost their status when their chieftain, King Balor, sought to depose Mab herself and claim Logris for his own, a plan foiled by Mab, resulting in the exile of Balor and his people to the mortal realm. Their ancient fortress of Grosscastle, once the primary military fortification in the Wilting Quarter, now lies empty and moss-eaten, for Mab cursed the castle such that any who slumbers in its depths will be driven mad with nightmares, waking in a frenzy and attacking those about them as if they were monstrous imposters; such was the fate of many Fomorians who succumbed to the spell on the eve of Balor’s would-be coup. Though the fortress remains ungarrisoned, adventurers sometimes venture into its shattered halls in search of the forgotten treasures of the Fomorians, for the giants were renowned for their craftsmanship and magic, and many of their wondrous creations can still be found within the cyclopean bowels of Grosscastle.

Horripilation Circus

Elves and Demons have never quite seen eye to eye, not because of their differences but rather their similarities – a narcissism of small differences often intrudes on relations betwixt Faerie and Hell, and due to the Truce and the Tithe of Souls Elfhame pays the Archdemons, the two are largely content to ignore one another, save for the occasional bickering between Annwn and infernal psychopomps over the fate of certain shades of the dead. Of the various Elfin realms, however, Logris maintains the strongest relationship with the Netherworld, as evinced by Horripilation Circus: a demoniac carnival, put on as entertainment for Queen Mab, a kind of gift to the Lady of Logris from Hecate, one of the dethroned sovereigns of Hell usurped by the Commonwealth of Pandemonium. The circus is a multiversal menagerie involving conjured horrors, otherworldly delicacies, surreal magical specatcles, and a panoply of other pleasures both subtle and gross. Many of the performers are demons; others are damned souls, mortals who have made pacts with the fell powers, and other outcasts, grotesques, and oddities culled from the dark corners of the cosmos.

Rotting Hill

Queen Mab herself is often found in the Wilted Quarter. When Her Moldy Majesty is present in Gossamer, she dwells within the Putrescent Palace, a grotesque fortress perched atop Rotting Hill – a reeking mass of lichenous rock, fruiting bodies, and decomposing vegetation. The Palace itself is a madhouse: crazed corridors loop and twist at impossible angles, packs of wild dogs roam from room to room in search of carrion, inscrutable clocks count the hidden hours of Elfhame, and the mad, laughing, blood-stained Queen herself presiding over it all, along with her numerous fetches, supernatural doubles through whose eyes she sees. The dungeons of the Palace are said to be a labyrinth of impossible depth and complexity, a warren of oubliettes and torture chambers in which prisoners and gaolors hunt one another in bizarre cat-and-mouse chases, sometimes seemingly changing roles and identities as all sense and sanity break down.

Shroomsbury

A district of alchemists and physicians, Shroomsbury is absolutely infested with gigantic fungi of every conceivable variety (and several inconceivable ones), their spores used to produce medicines and potions, as well as many of the poisons sold in the Brambles and the drugs sold in Wormwood. The district is notable for Napping Nog, a giant attacker who was laid low by soporific spores, fallen into a seemingly eternal coma; fungi have grown over his slumbering body, which has also become the centre of its own small neighbourhood. A stonesthrow from Nog lies the Collegium Gargantua, one of Gossamer’s few institutions of higher learning, founded with the mission of studying the sleeping giant; the Elfin enchanters at the Collegium have performed a wide variety of experiments on their softly snoring specimen, including entering the creature’s dreams to quite literally pick its brains for secrets of the primordial Jotnar. At the southern edge of the district lies the Red-Juice Sickhouse, a kind of hospital and laboratory where patients are treated with cures generated from the bodies of fungoid nurses – often with bizarre magical side-effects, to the continued fascination of the Fair Folk chirurgeons. Patients have been known to emerge from the Sickhouse with broken bones set or illnesses treated, while also beginning to age backwards, or acquiring strange phobias, or losing their shadows. Some have reported continuing to grow far beyond the heights typical of their species; others have complaned of developing “backup” ears and eyes; of being afflicted with wereslug therianthropy; of losing their childhood memories in exchange for those of others; of discovering the physicians have produced clonal copies of their bodies for disreputable purposes; and a myriad of other complaints. Still, there’s no arguing with results.

Wormwood

Little remains of the enchanted forest of Wormwood that preceded the Wilting Quarter, but one small neighbourhood preserves something of its eerie charms. Gossamer’s pleasure district, the place is home to numerous theatres, most notably the magnificent open-air Grove theatre, where plays older than some planes are regularly performed with elaborate ceremony, along with the latest bawdy satyr-plays and other lewd comedies, often skewering Faerie’s elites. Taverns, drug-dens, and cafes also abound, many serving absinthe, the signature drink of the district, in honour of the Green Fairy, an ancient member of the Fair Folk who can often be found roaming the verdurous streets, bewitching passersby with intoxicating illusions. Undoubtedly the centrepiece of the district is the gorgeous Nymphaeum. To call this temple of sensuous delights a “brothel” would almost be slanderous, for it is a shrine to hedonism, run by the descendants of the nymphs and satyrs who once dwelt in the ancient wood and have now adapted to city life; the overgrown pleasure-palace is an opulent world unto itself, as expensive as it is decadently luxurious. Finally, Wormwood is also the location of the Nest, a wyvern-aerie. The beasts have long ago been tamed by the locals, becoming far smaller in size and less ferocious in demeanor than their forebears; indeed, it is practically a faux-pas for a well-to-do Elf not to own a jewel-scaled dwarf wyvern, used much as mortals do a hunting hawk.

Hex Sessions XXXVI – Actual Play – “Shadows Lengthen”

By Bearded-Devil

On July 5, 2020

In Roleplaying

Various writing projects – D&D-related and otherwise – have kept me from keeping the detailed actual play posts for the Hex campaign. I had thought I might catch up on them during the summer, but by now even with notes I’m not sure I can do the logs true justice in the blow-by-blow fashion I did in previous sessions. I’m going to be resuming the Hex campaign shortly after a hiatus due to quarantine (I also have Elfhame actual play reports to post), so to catch up blog-readers, I’m going to be writing up some briefer accounts of several old sessions – these won’t be quite as detailed as some of the previous write-ups, but they’ll contain the most important story information.

All illustrations apart from the map and character portraits are from Bronwyn McIvor.

The characters in this session were:

Alabastor Quan, a gnome rogue-turned-warlock and failed circus ringmaster; wielder of a cursed dagger and member of the Ravenswing Thieves’ Guild.
Armand Percival Reginald Francois Eustace de la Marche III, a suspiciously pale, apparently human noble and sorcerer, and certainly not a ghoul (how dare such a thing be suggested).
Caulis, a homunculus warlock liberated from its master; has made a pact with certain Faerie Powers.
Comet the Unlucky, waspkin ranger, a dreamer and an idealist, longing for the restoration of the Elder Trees and the liberation of his people. Loathes the Harvester’s Guild, parasites and destroyers.
An ancient and enigmatic Lengian cleric of the Mother of Spiders, name unknown. She wears bulky ecclesiastical garments covering an uncertain number of limbs and goes by “Sister.”
Yam, an eccentric gnome illusionist and local graduate student at Umbral University. Yam cares little for money. Yam is curious. Yam is Yam.

XP Awarded: 1000 XP

*Caulis’s familiar Eleyin plays with the skeletal cat of Valentina Nettlecrave.*

The party undertook a reconaissance mission to Mount Shudder, having ascertained that the spectral city of Penumbra – seeking revenge on Hex for its destruction in centuries past – had manifested on that fell peak. Equipped by the lich Valentina Nettlecrave with a musical Exorcism Box which would cause ghosts to depart from possessed creatures when wound up and played and freshly supplied with ghostdust from a dealer in the Memento Mori tavern, the party headed west from Hex, traveling through several nearby towns and villages. These included the penal settlement of Beastbury, where prisoners from Hex were “reformed” by being polymorphed into beasts of burden; Greenheart, a lumber-town run by a family of dryads and humans; Zephyr, an industrial outpost of greenhouses and windmills, run on elemental labour; and the twin settlements of Soothwick and Knavesville, the former shrouded in a permanent Zone of Truth. Along the way the party encountered a number of Penumbral ghosts possessing polymorphed prisoners, sacred trees, and striking labourers, and used the Exorcism Box to dispel these malignant shades. They also encountered the merchant Hearthbrag, trading various items (Comet also tried to steal a dragon’s egg, but ended up grabbing a display replica).

The party pressed on into the Unquiet Mountains, encountering the trollblood clan known as the Spineskulls, a group of “toll-collectors” little better than brigands. Rather than fight, the party chose to negotiate, hiring the trollbloods on as guides. They investigated the abandoned spa-town of Snugging, discovering through judicious use of ghostdust that Penumbra had transformed the town into a forward operating base in the Ethereal plane. They sojourned on to Hog’s Hollow, suffering a truffle shortage due to the over-long winter the Variegated Company previously helped avert, and discovered further evidence of Penumbral activity. Traveling further to the Giant’s Head Inn, the party performed a ritual from the Book of Ghosts that allowed them to assume spectral form. They proceeded in ghostly form up the slopes of Mount Shudder.

*Exorcised ghosts in the industrial town of Zephyr are defeated.*

*The path through the mountains is the haunt of Penumbral wraiths – and muscle-bound troll toll-collectors.*

The trees thinned, and they could hear the sound of rushing water – a river, tumbling down the mountain in waterfalls. The forest continued to clear, giving way to bleak, frost-bitten stone. Snow blurred theirvison, but something was evident up ahead, emerging as if carved from the mountainside. Walls, towers, bridges – a formidable edifice of stone, glimmering and phantasmal, rising up the mountainside in seven tiers. A waterfall gushed from an enormous demoniac face at the city’s heights, falling down the tiers to a harbour below. A prodigious fortress guarded the entrance, a castle that looked as if it were hewn from a massive boulder. The city itself had a look of impossible age and forgotten grandeur. It was crowned by an enormous spire like a cyclopean torch, blazing with a ghastly blue effulgence that cast eerie black shadows across the city and the pristine white snow beyond. This was Penumbra, the City of Shadows, returned from out of the depths of the past to menace the world once again, and avenge itself upon its destroyers.

The party infiltrated the city using ghostly uniforms purloined from soldiers, claiming to be Penumbral forces. They explored the Moongate and the docklands of Fellwater, then ascended through the slum of the Dogsprawl, where spectral cynocephali howled and scratched ghost-fleas from their fur; up through the Circus Tenebrosus and into the market of the Wheel. After gathering what evidence they could of the numbers and composition of Penumbral forces, the party escaped the city, letting loose a flock of ghostly griffins shortly before the dawn, when their ghostly forms returned to their bodies.

Building Gossamer, Part 3 – Wormwood

By Bearded-Devil

On May 24, 2020

In Roleplaying

Gossamer begins to take shape. I moved south from Shroomsbury into Wormwood and the eastern edges of the Brambles. With 8 pages done, I am now nearly halfway through the Wilting Quarter, and 10% through the city overall.

Wormwood is a sort of urban forest, and also a pleasure-district – a maze of roots and mossy bridges and winding streets, ornate spires emerging from a miasma of perfume and psychedelic mist, all of it overgrown with trees and foliage. As with Shroomsbury, I decided on a few landmarks. Firstly, I wanted a wyvern nest, the beasts domesticated so that their venom would be milked and diluted into one of many potent drugs consumed in the district, many others coming from Shroomsbury to the north. Second, a theatre – I went with an Elizabethan-looking structure, the Grove. Finally I put in the lavish, over-the-top Nymphaeum, somewhere between a shrine and a brothel.

The economic function of the Wilting Quarter is taking shape. Drugs, reagents, poisons, potions – the district is about transformation and liminal states, which fits with the autumn theme of Logris, the fairy realm of Mab. I’m thinking this theme will be echoed in a different way in the part of the city ruled by Titania, Queen of Spring, in the southeast, opposite Mab’s domain.

Next up will be finishing off the bottom corner and the Brambles, a thorn-swathed slum, district of assassins and thieves. It’s also going to include a sprawling witch’s garden where various poisonous herbs are cultivated.

The city as a whole now looks like this:

I was also thinking about how the Quarters will connect to one another – I may end up putting a big bridge between the Wilting Quarter and the Withered Quarter, the wintry section that will be directly east of this part. There’s a nice untaken spot off Deepshade square that would be easy to graft the bridge to without a lot of finnicky re-drawing. Once I’m finished with the Wilted Quarter I’ll likely move clockwise, moving through the Winter, Spring, and finally Summer sections of the city.

Building Gossamer, Part 2 – Shroomsbury

By Bearded-Devil

On May 21, 2020

In Roleplaying

Four pages into mapping, the results look like this:

Even at this stage I needed to make some adjustments to the image – tiny misalignments, a paper slightly askew here, a scanning margin there, all meant that to make the images mesh I needed to expand and contract parts of the map, add a stairway here and a cluster of fungi there. This can be fiddly, but in some ways there’s a silver lining – these sorts of realignments tend to further disguise the gaps between pages and give the final result a slightly more organic look while still preserving the overall design.

With the images digitally sewn together, I then started adding names. I sometimes have a list of street ideas jotted down, but generally I make them up as I go. I named the giant (Napping Nog) and labelled a few especially important landmarks. There was some space left around some larger structures, so I decided retroactively to make these notable locations, labelling them the Wheezing Tower and the Collegium Gargantua – I’ll figure out details for these locations later, but the Colelgium will likely be a school focused on sleep-magic and psychedelic enchantments, while the tower might belong to a wizardly cabal. Making “discoveries” like this preserves a certain sense of spontaneity during the process.

Up next I’ll be starting a new district – possibly Wormwood, Rotting Hill, or the Brambles.

Building Gossamer, Part 1 – Overall Concept

By Bearded-Devil

On May 20, 2020

In Roleplaying

I’m drawing a new city – Gossamer, capital city of Elfhame – and thought this would be a good opportunity to show my process for desgining and mapping fantasy cities. This is something of a companion post to “How I Run a Citycrawl Campaign.”

Overall Concept

I start by thinking of the overall concept for the city – who rules it, what its economic and political purpose is, what its overall shape should be, its overall aesthetic, and which historical cities I can take as models. For Hex, I knew I wanted to create a magical university town, I knew I wanted the city to be shaped like a hexagon cut through by a river, and I took some broad inspiration from cities like London, Rome, and my home city of Vancouver. For Erubescence I knew I wanted to construct a vampiric capitol where the Night Queen traps her nobles at court with water (since vampires can’t cross it), and the idea of a pentagram stuck in my mind; my real-world references were Venice and Paris, with a little bit of St. Petersburg.

Gossamer, the Big Cobweb, is going to be the central metropolis of Elfhame, placed at the converge of the four realms of Logris, Annwn, Tír na nÓg, and Mag Mell (Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer). I want it to be literally cut into four, with two rivers carving the realms up, their confluence serving as the site of the city. Since I like giving cities a distinctive shape, and since I’ve picked the name Gossamer for the capitol, I’ve decided to make the city look like a giant cobweb, with canals taking the place of the webbing. This design is partly inspired by Amsterdam and Bruges, the two cities that I’ll be taking most of my visual cues from this time. The canals of Amsterdam were originally a series of defensive moats that slowly transformed into commercial waterways, which I’ll use as the basis for the web-like design in Gossamer.

Getting Started

The idea of the city will be that there are four major “quarters” to it, each technically a different country. Gossamer will thus have a bit of the vibe of somewhere like East/West Berlin and other “divided cities” (this is partly inspired by The City and the City, which I’m teaching this summer). Each of the four quarters will have a different ruler, different laws, and a starkly different feel to it. They’ll also need a unique visual identity, so that while the map looks like one city overall, the quarters also feel quite distinct from one another. In the very middle of the city where the quarters meet will be a dockyard and bazaar.

I decided to start with Mab’s quarter, the Wilting Quarter, a borough of eternal autumn and decay. I jotted down some prospective names of districts: Rotting Hill, Grosscastle, Shroomsbury, the Wartward, the Brambles, Wormwood, and Horripilation Circus. For each of these I made notes on how I wanted each district to look, and its purpose within the city. For example, Shroomsbury, the district I’m starting with, is going to be the fungoid district, will have giant toadstool structures, and will be a significant manufacturer of drugs and potions – the alchemist’s district as well. This means it’ll include lots of wizard’s towers, laboratories, and similar places, but it will also be an organic sprawl of buildings and fungi (I picked this first because I figured it’d be fun and easy to draw – a good starting point).

To make sure that the map coheres, my first step is to find a pattern that fits my picture of the city. After some quick googling I was able to produce this:

This will be the “blueprint” for the Wilted Quarter.

Which, when resized and printed off, becomes this:

Each of these sections is numbered so that I know how they fit together. I now have a bluprint for the city and can begin actually drawing, placing the map over each section so that the shape of the canals is maintained. I began in the top right-hand corner. After some consideration I’ve decided that the Wilting Quarter does not have walls, but like Bruges uses waterways for defense (I think the Mag Mell and Annwn sections – names not yet determined – might have walls). I want this part of the city to be a sprawl, with structures throughout even the large sections without canals along the edges – indeed, these hinterlands will be the location of the Fairy Queens’ and Kings’ palaces, as far from their rivals as possible.

With a blueprint ready, I then sketched out roughly where each of the seven districts within the Wilting Quarter would be placed. The four “inner” districts will be the Wartward, Wormwood, the Brambles, and Shroomsbury, while the “outer” districts will include Rotting Hill, Grosscastle, and Horripilation Circus, since those districts will benefit from having more space – the first will be a mansion-encrusted hill, the second a series of gigantic ruins built by the exiled Fomorians, and the third will be a sort of demonic amusement park.

District 1: Shroomsbury

With the basics sketched out, I started drawing.

I use the blueprint to guide the drawing and keep track of things like canal position and which district goes where.

As each section is completed, I scan the results and tweak contrast. The result looks like this, for one page of the map. This section will take 20 pages, which means the overall map will be 80 pages.

One down, 79 to go. Shroomsbury needs some more landmarks, something to make it stand out apart from just being made of fungi. I brainstormed some ideas, including:

A giant who has been lulled into sleep by the psychedelic spores and now has buildings and fungi built all over him. I do have a giant head already in Erubescence (a zombified trophy), but I like the idea that this visual links the two cities, who were frequent allies in wars with the Giants before the Seven Years’ Mischief sundered the peace. I also like placing “passive threats” in my cities, like swords of Damocles – things that PCs could “set off” if they disturb, like the infectious Thornmaze in Erubescence or the protoplasmic monster in the Warded Ward in Hex.
A giant compost heap/garbage tip, essentially the cesspits and mass graves of the city, which can of course spawn all sorts of monsters and threats.
Since this is the alchemists’ and apothecaries’ district, a fungal hospital or leper house could be interesting, where patients go to have experimental cures involving bizarre growths and drugs.

I then drew the next page of the city, adding in the fungal hospital. This requires some care, lining things up with the precious page, like so:

Scan, boost contrast, reduce light a little, and the second page looks like this:

Now I simply edit these two pages together. I like to perform some minor tweaks at this point to make sure the pieces segue smoothly. I place broader streets at the join between areas, while occasionally interrupting those streets with diagonal canals or long buildings to disguise the fact I’m piecing the maps together as a series of 8.5/11″ pages.

When I add the first two pages together they look like this:

Looking back to the blueprint, I’ve now drawn the first two pages on the top right corner.

In subsequent posts, I’ll share progress on this map as I complete districts and quarters. I’m going to be starting with Shroomsbury in its entirety, and then we’ll spread out from there. Once Shroomsbury is done I’ll get into labelling and naming things, and then start to brainstorm more ideas for the adjacent districts – I have thoughts for each of them, but the specifics aren’t fully worked out, which is part of the fun.

Elfhame Session 2 – Actual Play – The Barrow of King Finvarra

By Bearded-Devil

On April 13, 2020

In Roleplaying

The characters in this session were:

XP Awarded: 350 XP

After Sparks started a fight to free to pixie Babs, the party slew several goblins of the Bonegrubber tribe, inhabitants of the Upper Tombs of Lord Finvarra’s barrow. The fight began with Sparks firing off a Firebolt, followed by Blue-Eyed Molly sliming seveal of the goblins with glowing green ectoplasm. Fun-Guy, coaxing the gigantic drunken Cat Sith from the other chamber, lobbed the huge feline into the goblin ranks, producing a hissing, snarling, spitting ball of chaos. As goblins scrambled to evade the cat, Susurrus sowed confusion amongst foes and inspiration among allies, while the stealthy Wick worked through the mob, stabbing kidneys and skewering goblins in the back. Petallu swirled her sword in a beautiful but stunningly inefficient pattern, aimed way too high for goblin necks, while Mud bashed a goblin over his skull, splitting it in two.Weevil, vexed at the death of other goblins, chose to clobber several unconscious rather than kill them. The fight ended when Molly cast Sleep to subdue the remaining combatants, including the winesop cat.

While Sparks and Petallu spoke to Babs (and got her some false wings made up, courtesy of Petallu’s tailor), heavy footsteps were audible down the corridor as something came to investigate the commotion.

“What’s all this then?!” a gruff voice demanded. “Who defiles Lord Lousewort’s domain?”

“Invited guests!” the affable Mud said smoothly, stepping up to block any sight of the carnage close behind them.

“Yes, don’t you know who we are?” Blue-Eyed Molly retorted. “I’m Blue-Eyed Molly, famed bard. Your lord invited us to play for him.”

Fennrix used Friends to help convince the lumbering ogre, while Weevil played on his goblin cred. Eventually the ogre – who apologetically introduced himself as “Nosebiter,” led them down the hall; meanwhile Susurrus and Wick hid the bodies and sleeping goblins.

The party was shown in to meet the grotesque Lord Lousewort and his wives, Bloodeyes, Toothsome Jenny, and Curlyhorns.

“Who’re all these people?” the goblins demanded – a gangly, long-limbed creature splayed over his throne, his brain stranglely swollen in its skull. He scratched his belly and flipped idly through a mouldering-looking spellbook while snacking on some sort of fungus.

“Blue-Eyed Molly and friends,” the bard proclaimed. “You invited me, don’t you remember? I’m a famed entertainer, here to regale your fine court with song…”

Flattery seemed to have proved a wise tactic, and after a few more exchanges Molly was led into a dank “dressing room” to prepare, while the rest of the party – having carefully hid the goblin bodies in sarcophagi – made themselves comfortable. As word spread through the goblin barrow, goblins began pouring into the chamber, introducing themselves with names like Fuckwit, Drool, Batbreath, Wibbly, and Wobbly. Mud conversed with Lord Lousewort’s wives and managed to acquire some exotic spices, and bits and pieces of the embalmed elfin dead the goblins considered a delicacy.

After preparations, the concert was soon underway, with Fennrix adding an illusory multi-coloured feline disco ball, Susurrus on horns, and Blue-Eyed Molly on her tin-whistle. The goblins writhed, danced, and drank, smashing their heads into one another and leaping about the room in a bacchanalian frenzy. Even the Cat Sith wandered back in and, after vomiting all over the floor, engaged in the festivities, swigging from her enchanted bottomless goblet.

At the climax of this concert, Susurrus blew the Drudehorn and conjured a nightmare, Mary, lighting the Lanthorn of Renewal in the tomb, which repaired the broken pillars.

The party initially mistook the lamp for the Sacred Cauldron itself, and later realized they would need this item to bypass the collapse elsewhere in the ruins.

The rousing concert was sufficient for the party to convince Lord Lousewort to lend them the Lanthorn; he also told them that the Sacred Cauldron might be found in the Lower Tombs.

Suitably equipped, the party used the Lanthorn to clear the blockage they had discovered back near the entrance – only to discover the statues in the hall animating to attack! Petallu convinced some to go after the “goblin trespassers,” while quickly snuffing the lamp returned the blockage to its previous state.

While the blockage was cleared they also found the remains of a knight and a pixie, as well as the Lion’s Shield and the Acorn Key. The party again used the Lanthorn (carried by Fennrix) to descend a newly-repaired stair, and glimpsed the slimy tail of some hideous beast disappearing down a tunnel.

Choosing a different route instead, the party crossed a previously ruinous bridge with the aid of the magical lamp and came to the Hall of Years – which they found mysteriously unlocked. An inscription read: “To Pass the Hall of Years, Thou Must Remain the Same Age As Thou Wert When Thou Entered.”

Here, Mud’s Druidic knowledge of runes (the closest he has to reading) and a degree of trial and error enabled the party to figure out a path across the warded aging and de-aging tiles to remain the same age as they entered.

The party looted the Royal Tomb beyond, discovering a series of journal entries by Fraff the Foolish – a gnome adventurer from the city of Hex – who apparently was transformed into the Lindworm. He told of the sinister Green-Fingered Gentleman and his desire to use the Sacred Cauldron of Rebirth to revive the long-dead Erlking, champion of primal Elfhame, rebel against the four Faeire Kings and Queens. From their knowledge of history the party deduced that this individual would likely have headed to either Joyous Gard or Dolorous Guard, two fortresses in Mag Mell where the Erlking or his Fetch – a kind of magical double used for purposes of strategic and political deception – was reputed to have been killed in centuries past.

Investigating the tomb with the Lanthorn, the party accidentally restarted the magic that reanimated the giant Fachan, a skeletal monstrosity and guardian of the tomb. Although Blue-Eyed Molly managed to blow off the thing’s legs, it was still a terrible opponent.

A fierce fight ensued that nearly saw Petallu and Sparks killed, the giant sweeping the terrible Ablach Flail left and right to scatter his foes; the elfin knight and pixie were sent flying, hitting the far wall with twin sickening smacks. After pelting the giant with spells and blades, the group of would-be heroes lured Fachan to the sarcophagus of Lord Finvarra, over which a stone had fallen, and then through Weevil’s clever use of the Lanthorn managed to break his back with the stone, destroying him once again. Petallu then obliterated his skull and scattered the fragments in the Hall of Years.

Thorough investigation of the tomb yielded the Royal Signet Ring of the King, and a few gold pieces.

The party made their escape, only to encounter the tail’s owner once more – a vile Lindworm, lured into exposing itself via a clever illusion! The hissing beast caused the illusion to disperse and turned to face the party, slaver dripping from its jaws…

The hideous Lindworm proved amenable to tasty treats.

Before it could strike, however, Mud offerred forth some of the sweatmeats of Lord Lousewort’s wives. The Lindworm sniffed, cocked a scabrous brow, and took a tentative bite of the goblin treats…

What followed was not a fight but a very pleasant meat tea, over the course of which the Lindworm began to remember his life from before his transformation by Dragon-Fever, an illness common to tomb-robbers in Elfhame, wherein a desire to hoard wealth and leave it unspent transforms the miser into a serpent. It seemed the creature was none other than Fraff the Foolish himself, penned down in the tomb for some time.

Returning to the surface, the party found themselves faced by a roomfull of goblins, who had discovered the dead bodies after some of the unconscious warriors came to. Lord Lousewort – strapped to Nosebiter’s stomach – demanded the return of his Lanthorn. Susurrus instead blew the Drudehorn and scattered the goblins, including the protesting Lord Lousewort, strapped to Nosebiter’s stomach, who screamed protests as his warriors scattered.

The heroes emerged into the sunlight, and in moments Fraff reverted to his gnome form, sloughing off his dragon-scales and the avarice that had cursed him.

The Sacred Cauldron was not at the Barrow of King Finvarra, but the heroes now knows who stole it – and why. Resolving to cover more ground, they split into two parties, one to investigate Joyous Gard, the other Dolorous Gard.

A Century of Weird Fiction, 1832-1937: Disgust, Metaphysics and the Aesthetics of Cosmic Horror

By Bearded-Devil

On April 6, 2020

In Academic

This is not a gaming-related post, but may interest some of this blog’s readers, since there’s a certain degree of overlap between my gaming interests and my academic ones.

The University of Wales Press has just published my first academic monograph, A Century of Weird Fiction, 1832-1937: Disgust, Metaphysics and the Aesthetics of Cosmic Horror. This book grew out of my dissertation on weird fiction, completed at the University of British Columbia.

The book is a study of weird fiction by key authors during the period indicated, beginning with Poe and ending with Lovecraft. In essence, it argues that in contrast with many of the clasically Gothic works that the Weird grows out of, weird fiction is focused not on human interiority – psychology, history, taboos, the buried secrets the Gothic spectrally manifests – but on the non-human, on the nature of reality itself. Furthermore, it suggests that the aesthetic key to this investigation into the primal, mysterious nature of things lies in the power of disgust. Disgust arises when what we’ve demarcated as “not-us” encroaches upon what we’ve defined as “us” – when the self is threatened with contamination from the Outside. Weird fiction, I argue in the book, is obsessed with this kind of confrontation, a breach of borders queasily suggesting that many of our self-conceptions are delusions – especially the idea that we are trascendental souls or hermetically sealed selves that can be separated from the unclean, physical world around us. Instead, these texts intimate, we are enmeshed in a seething, oozing, often eerily agentive morass of roiling materiality, a chaotic, messy, deeply weird universe. In the works of authors like Lovecraft, Hodgson, Blackwood, and others, stable boundaries between us and not-us, the self the the world, are exposed as anthropocentric conceits.

There’s a lot about monsters, slime, sentient tree-things, possession, putrescence, quasi-molluscoid hill-people, infectious fungi, and similar glooping horror. While written primarily for a scholarly audience, I’m of the belief that works of literary criticism don’t have to be rendered in dry, antiseptic prose, or as a stream of dense abstractions only intelligible to experts in continental philosophy. Indeed, I was playfully accused in my thesis defense of having adopted something of the style of weird fiction itself – lush, ornate, and a touch lurid – a charge to which I proudly plead guilty.

A Century of Weird Fiction, 1832-1937: Disgust, Metaphysics and the Aesthetics of Cosmic Horror is available through U of Wales Press, U of Chicago Press for North American distribution (there may currently be some delays there), and can be pre-ordered on Amazon and Indigo.

Elfame Session 1 – Actual Play – Quest for the Sacred Cauldron

By Bearded-Devil

On April 5, 2020

In Roleplaying

The characters in this session were:

XP Awarded: 200 XP

Once upon a time, in the land of Elfhame, a group of would-be heroes journeyed to the Glass Fortress of Glistermarch, heeding summons of Lady Una, a Seelie princess of the Royal Blood. They were eight in number, the sardonic shade bard Blue-Eyed Molly, the mad pixie sorcerer Fennrix, the tragicomic fungoig barbarian Fun Guy, the chef and woodwose druid Mud, the aforementioned Petalu Morriden, Knight of Harts, the irascible pixie sorcerer Sparks, the hard-bitten goblin mercenary Weevil Stench, and the enigmatic firbolg rogue Wick. Two others followed Petalu, the squire Tiesel and servant Bellaquick.

The party briefly tarried with Rhiannon, the lady in the moon, a Tatzelwrum guarding the borders fof Glistermarch in the Realm of Tír na nÓg, and the merchant Hawthorn (whose broken cart the druid Mud fixed), and acquired some magical candles in the village of Wick, where enormous beehives produced wax which fey chandlers then animated, directing the semi-sentient waxkin to pour themselves into moulds.

At the fortress, Petalu convinced the guards of the party’s good intentions, and they were led into the heart of the keep to meet with the princess.

“You have come here having heard of my need for heroes,” the princess said. “The truth is that the Quest beforeyou is in the service of all Elfhame. Look now upon Her Highness, Queen of Tír na nÓg, Titania.”

With a gesture, one wall of the chamber shimmered, and they saw the Queen Titania herself, ruler of Tír na nÓg; she appears to be asleep, her face pale and drawn, her hair not its famed gold but streaked with white and grey.

“Some weeks past, my mother fell into this slumber,” Lady Una said. “What manner of poison, curse, or illness has afflicted her, we do not know, though it is beyond all magic or remedy we have attempted. But it is affecting the realm.” She gestured again, and the view shifted, replaced with a vision of a decaying woodland, the trees twisted and riddled with fungi, some dead and leafless. “As Monarch of Spring, Queen Titania sustains the Everlasting youth of Tír na nÓg,” the princess explains. “As she fades, the land itself is beginning to sicken. Should she die, all of Elfhame will plunge into chaos – the natural order will be disrupted. The borders of our realms will be fatally breached.

“Some believe this to be the work of the Unseelie Court. Though suspicions naturally fall to Queen Mab, even she knows that Elfhame requires a balance between forces. Should Tír na nÓg lose its vitality, Mab’s own realm would suffer as well. Even dark Lord Arawn would not threaten the stability of the Wheel of Seasons.

“Whatever the cause, Elfhame must act if we are to save Queen Titania. I believe our best hope is an artefact of great power, one of the Thirteen Treasures of Elfhame – the Sacred Cauldron of Rebirth. It is said that any who drinks of the Cauldron will be cured of all illness and purged of all poison, restored to the first blush of youth.

“Like all Thirteen Treasures, the Cauldron is fated to pass from one hand to the next, never to be possessed by any single owner for long. As such, I cannot tell of its whereabouts with any certainty – rumour and legend are our only guides. The last known location of the Cauldron was in the hands of King Finvarra, husband of High Queen Nicneven, father of both Queen Titania and Queen Mab. It is believed that the Cauldron was one of many treasures interred with King Finvarra when he died. As such, I suggest you begin by seeking his tomb, which lies on the border of Tír na nÓg and Annwn, deep in the Gloamwood at the hill of Cnoc Ma.

“As for a reward – beyond ensuring an eternal place in song, should you return with the Sacred Cauldron, each of you shall be granted one of the precious Royal Wishes – anything it is in my power to grant, you will be given.”

After a heart heroic feast – complete with psychic dessert – the party set out at twilight through the Gloamwood.

The party’s first encounter was with a pair of monstrous slugs in the depths of the woods, devouring what appeared to be decomposing leaves – anathema in Tír na nÓg! Fennrix and Mud made quick work of one with a mixture of fire and salt, while Fun Guy and Weevil butrchered a second. Attempts to befriend additional slugs looked dicey, so the party pressed on.

They next assisted the treefolk bard Susurrus Psithurisma with a band of errant torch-bearing pixies. The treefolk, from Oberon’s court in Mag Mell, gladly joined the party’s quest. Petalu also spotted a red-eyed owl and asked it to help put out some of the fires of the pixies.

After an uneventful watch, the paryt pressed on along the Greenroad, lingering briefly by an overturned carriage from which protruded a black-fletched arrow, somewht reminiscent of those famously used by the followers of the Erlking, who wanted to return Elfhame to its “primal” nature – but the Erlkin has been dead for nearly a thousand years. Coincidence? Mud also found a magical emereld.

Weevil found a cold iron dagger, dropped by a petrified goblin.

The party had another encounter with a flock of randy cockatrices, after the mischievous Fennrix immitated the mating call. of the basilisk With spells and blades they quickly dispatched the ferocious birds – and found themselves dinner.

Grateful for liberation from the cockatrice and drawn by the entrancing smells of roast fowl, various beasts of the woodlands joined the party for a jamboree that night. In conversation with some bears, Wick heard tell of witch-like spirits in the deep woods, dwelling in a dead tree – gwyllion, souls of the dead who did not pass into Annwn but lingered by its northern border.

Resting that morning the party enduring some… strange dreams as a result of eating the meat of cockatrices preparing to mate…

Travelling that afternoon, the party discovered a series of severed goblin body-parts on the fog-swathed trail that led like gruesome breadcrumbs into the woods. Sparks removed a hexing ward from one of the trees.

At the dead tree, the party attacked the lurking spirits that skulked in the fog, lured out by a clever illusion. A fortuitous shaft of sunlight caused the gwyllion to flee into their tree, which Blue-Eyed Molly then uprooted with Thunderwave. Cast out into the light, several of the ghosts were easily dispatched, their apparent leader slain by Weevil with the cold iron knife.

Amidst the bones of the dead the party discovered the Drudehorn, a nightmare-conjuring hunting horn. The tomb was set on a hill that rose up out of the forest, looming like the head of some terrible beast. Snow fell softly, a cold wind blowing in from Annwn, distantly visible to the north – a bleak vastness of jagged mountains and windswept moorland, shrouded in a perpetual brume. The mound was marked by a ring of menhirs, like some ancient crown.

The gates of the Tomb of King Finvarra must once have been resplendent, being intricately carved with elaborate bas-reliefs showing the deeds of the former co-ruler of Elfhame – his war with Hell, and the peace that led to the Tithe; the tricking of the red and white dragon that once wreaked havoc over Elfhame, when he poisoned a pit full of mead with a sleeping draught, then filled in the pit over their slumbering bodies; his victory of the cyclopean Fachan, former ruler of Avalon and wielder of a terrible flail with heads like spiked apples, dripping poison; his marriage to Nicnevan, which brought peace to Faerie; his glorious death in the battle against the rebellious Gwyn ap Nudd, the cambion son of Arawn.

Now, however, the gates had been pried open, one ripped entirely from its hinge, marred with chisel marks. What’s more, the carvings had been defaced, with a ridiculous moustache and even-more ridiculous priapic cock and swollen testicles added to Finvarra, and enormous heaving tits scrawled over the carving of Nicnevan, with a puff of air indicating the High Queen of Elfhame was farting.

The adventurers crept inside and found a long, dim hall; mutilated forms loomed amidst a sea of dust. Shrouded in cobwebs, the broken remains of half a dozen statues stood, their heads and arms broken off, their bodies adorned with crude graffiti, severed heads chipped and disfigured with scrawled-on faces. Weevil pasued, admiring the craftsmanship of the graffiti. The way forward was blocked by a collapse.

Exploring the Upper Tombs, they passed by a door where something scratched and clawed, trying to get free of its tomb; this they passed by, entering another chamber and discovering an enormous Cat Sith, drinking wine from a bottomless goblet. The crept further into the tombs, hearing laughter and shrieks up ahead, and soon discovered a group of goblins betting on a fight between a squirrel and a wingless pixie. Despite Weevil’s boisterous charms and attempts to befriend the goblin gamblers, the appearance of the rest of the party and the rage of Sparks at the sight of pixie-torture seemed to make a fight inevitable…