Gosnell as Horror

Today, I am going to take a break from my series on the Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus to write about one of the better American movies I have seen in a long time. Recently, I went to see Gosnell. The movie follows the detectives and prosecutors involved in the arrest and trial of one of America’s most prolific serial killers; however, let’s be upfront. Despite the protestations of several of its characters and the movie’s focus on the trial and its proceedings, Gosnell is a about abortion.

This is subtly made clear by the movie’s main character, detective James Wood. In the opening scenes he is shown three times telling people in his life, “As I see it, you have two choices…” We are never told what those two choices are; however, in context of the movie the two choices are meant to be: do you side with Gosnell or not? do you side with a legal system the enables Gosnell or not? do you side with the institutions that made Gosnell possible or not?

The purpose of this post, however, is not to go on some political screed about how awful abortion is (although, I will admit that seeing my eldest daughter dance inside the womb at 11 weeks in response to the laughter of my wife has had a major impact on my opinion on the matter). Rather, it is to meditate on how Gosnell is one of the best horror experiences I have ever had in the movie theater and how that repeated statement by detective James Wood is instrumental in making Gosnell into the masterful, if unconventional, horror movie that it is.

As I have stated in the past, I am not a huge horror movie fan. I find most of it to be excruciatingly boring. For the purposes of this post, I will focus on the following reasons:

1. I am rarely actually horrified by what I see on screen.
2. The graphic violence shoved down my throat always pales in comparison to what my own imagination had been envisioning up until the point that the fake blood and guts started flowing.

Gosnell, on the other hand, not only succeeds in horrifying its audience, but it also trusts in the audience’s own imagination.

By framing the movie with the implied moral choice that results in Gosnell, the movie effectively implicates its audience in what is happening on screen. The audience, in part, is responsible for what happened inside Gosnell’s house of horrors. Thus, the movie effectively holds up a mirror to its audience and makes it squirm with horror at what it sees.

Gosnell also staunchly refuses to show virtually anything. Gosnell collected the feet of his victims in bottles of formaldehyde, but this is as graphic as anything shown on screen. When detective Wood finds these bottles while investigating the inside of Gosnell’s “clinic,” an abortion takes place — off screen. All we see is the blood on Gosnell’s surgical gloves. Left alone to our own imagination, the horror of what went on inside that building is amplified well beyond anything that special effects artists or CGI could ever accomplish.

This is how I run horror in my campaigns. I allow my players to have the freedom to make moral choices, to see the consequences of those choices and to leave most of the graphic stuff up to their own imaginations.

As I have said on more than one occasion, if you want to see a monster look in the mirror. Gosnell is an experience that makes you do exactly that.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 5 Part 2

In the 5th Chapter of his Epistle to Diognetus, Mathetes attempts to describe a typical Christian:

For the Christians are distinguished from other men neither by country, nor language, nor the customs which they observe. For they neither inhabit cities of their own, nor employ a peculiar form of speech, nor lead a life which is marked out by any singularity. The course of conduct which they follow has not been devised by any speculation or deliberation of inquisitive men; nor do they, like some, proclaim themselves the advocates of any merely human doctrines. But, inhabiting Greek as well as barbarian cities, according as the lot of each of them has determined, and following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly paradoxical method of life.

In other words, there is no real way to classify a Christian by normal, societal means. They defy the normal stratification of human society. To quote St. Paul:

Here there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scyth′ian, slave, free man, but Christ is all, and in all. — Colossians 3:11

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. — Galatians 3:28

For those interested in power, this is a very dangerous idea. Power is gained and maintained by pitting artificially created groups against each other.

In context of an FRPG, this suggests that Christians can be found in all walks of life, including those who walk in such circles as the imperial family. Thus, one of the first questions that I asked at the beginning of this series (Is Diognetus sympathetic to Christianity?) seems to be answered here in the affirmative.

Given the horror show I spun out of the phrase that Christians “do not cast away their fetuses,” Diognetus now appears as someone truly horrified by what he has witnessed walking through the upper echelons of society and wishes to find out more of Christianity to see if it is a more agreeable way of seeing and living in the world.

This also means that Christian NPCs can be sprinkled everywhere in the campaign, possible creating a very interesting espionage feel to the background noise of a campaign. Should PCs be Christian, they’d be constantly tested to see if they could be trusted and then secretly allowed in to various parts of society. If the PCs aren’t Christian, then they could possibly be constantly be spied upon.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 5 Part 1

In the 5th Chapter of his Epistle to Diognetus, Mathetes delineates how Christians are different in manner from other citizens of the Empire. In one of his more intriguing statements, he notes:

They marry, as do all [others]; they beget children; but they do not destroy their offspring.

The translation here is more poetic and practical than literal — “destroy their offspring” literally means “cast away fetuses.” I always find it fascinating how little human behavior changes over time. The ways in which modern Americans behave in a similar fashion to pagan Rome and the ways in which Christians criticize such behavior in both contexts never ceases to amaze me.

In context of an FRPG this little phrase opens the door to a horror element in the campaign world that suggests one of my favorite intelligent undead. In the MMI, ghouls are described as “undead” with quotes:

Ghouls are “undead,” once human creatures which feed on human and other corpses…their change from human to ghoul has deranged and destroyed their minds…

Ghasts are described:

These creatures are so like ghouls as to be completely indistinguishable from them…however…they exude a carrion stench in a 10’ radius which causes retching and nausea unless a saving throw versus poison is made.

In addition, while the stat block of ghouls indicate they have low intelligence, the ghast stat block indicates that they are very intelligent.

Imagine, for a moment, that the reason the Empire so blithely “casts away fetuses” is that not only are they considered delicacies by the aristocracy, but are an important rite of passage for the upper classes. Regular consumption of dead human flesh turns the aristocracy into “undead.” This process destroys the minds of the weak, thus culling from the aristocratic class members who cannot stoop to such debauchery.

This all suggests that the elders within aristocratic houses are all ghasts and regularly hold fetes where human fetuses are the center piece of the main course. Since ghasts exude a rancid stench of such potency as to require a saving throw, perfume would be in very high demand among the upper echelons of the imperial elite.

In fact, I could well imagine an entire adventure centered around the theft of a shipment of perfume to a ghast just ahead of having to make a public appearance…

This all implies the delicious irony that PCs who throw their lot in with one of the aristocratic houses will be working for a baby-consuming ghast. It would be very interesting to see player’s reactions when they realize the truth.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 4 Part 3

In yesterday’s post, I felt rather unsatisfied with my musings about the ways that solar cycles affect the magics of the pagan priests of the nascent campaign world that is emerging from my study of the Epistleof Mathetes to Diognetus. As a consequence, I did a bit of research about the religious cults of Rome prior to Christianity and found some very interesting tidbits.

The patron god of Rome was Mars, who was originally an agricultural deity. It wasn’t until Rome began to expand its territory by force that Mars morphed into a god of war. By the time of Christ, however, Mars had largely been supplanted by the Emperor Cult. This reinforces my instinct to use the anti-cleric as one of the pagan priest classes. Since war is a central theme within the Mars/Emperor Cult, it seems appropriate that their priests should be able to fight. The anti-cleric fits this profile nicely and also backs up the idea of an undead slave economy where priests of the Emperor Cult are called on to be the main controllers of the undead slave population.

One of the oldest cults imported by the Romans from other cultures was that of Cybele. Originally a goddess from Asia Minor, Cybele became popular during the Second Punic War when Rome narrowly defeated Carthage. While Cybele was an earth-mother goddess, she was also seen as a protector in times of war. Of interest to my current project, priests of the Cybelean Cult were eunuchs. Thus, my instinct for having low born magic-users be both male and castrated was more spot on than I thought.

This is further reinforced by the demographics of one of the most popular mystery cults in Rome, Mithraism. Cultists were exclusively male and almost universally low born. What really interests me about Mithraism, however, has to do with yesterday’s post.

In its art. the cult almost always depicted Mithras sacrificing a bull surrounded by various creatures. These were most often a dog, a scorpion and a serpent. All of these animals correspond to constellations. We don’t know a lot about the practices of the mystery cults, but there is some interesting scholarly work that hypothesizes that the emphasis on animals corresponding to constellations indicates that the cult paid attention to how the position of the sun related to each of these constellations through the course of the year.

In other words, the bonus spell available to pagan priests could be determined by which of the constellations is currently closest to the sun. I also plan to include a period of the year in which the sun is roughly equidistant from these constellations and, therefore, no bonus spells are available.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 4 Part 2

In the 4th Chapter of his Epistle to Diognetus, Mathetes talks about the various observances of the Jews. Among them he lists the facts that they use a lunar calendar:

And as to their observing months and days, as if waiting upon the stars and the moon, and their distributing, according to their own tendencies, the appointments of God, and the vicissitudes of the seasons, some for festivities and others for mourning…

In Jewish practice (at the time of Mathetes and Diognetus), the day begins at sunset when three stars are visible in the sky.

As an aside, one of the most aesthetically pleasing games I have ever played is Dragon Pass, Avalon Hill’s reprint of Chaosium’s White Bear & Red Moon. I own a digital copy just for the sake of mining it for ideas. I have always far more enjoyed reading the background text and looking at units and maps than I ever did actually playing the game. One factor that always intrigued me was the idea that the Lunar Empire had troops whose Combat Factor was reliant on the phase of the Red Moon.

Since the religious observances of the Jews noted by Mathetes are reliant upon a lunar calendar, as opposed to the solar calendar used by the Empire, I am sore tempted to add some mechanics that suggest the arcane magic ebbs and flows according to various astrological bodies. I am further tempted to have these mechanics differ between the Vrayosi, whose magic is affected by the moon, and the arcane casters of the Empire, whose magic would be affected by the sun.

The mechanic I am most inclined to use is the concept of a bonus spell. In favorable times, the caster gets a bonus spell. If I am feeling ambitious, this spell may even be a specific spell associated with the time of the year/month. During unfavorable times, those bonus spells just aren’t there.

There are, however, other spell mechanics which might prove interesting, such as duration, range, damage, area, etc. One could go to the Metamagic Feats of 3e for ideas and inspiration.

I am also tempted to have all Vrayosi characters (dwarves, elves and halflings) be affected by the phases of the moon in one or more of the following areas:

• Saving Throws
• AC
• To Hit Rolls
• Damage Rolls
• Surprise Rolls

At full moon they gain the equivalent of a +2. At new moon they are -2. During the 1d4+1 days prior and after that bonus/penalty is decreased by 1. I must admit that I would probably make players roll on a random table to see which effects take place.

At this point, I am thinking that the Empire version of arcane magic gets the bonus spell (at sunrise? noon? sunset?), the Vrayosi version of arcane magic gets a random metamagic feat and all Vrayosi get a bonus/penalty.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 4 Part 1

In Chapter 4 of his Epistle to Diognetus, Mathetes continues to demonstrate practices of the Jews that differentiate them from Christians. One of the first that he mentions is their “boasting about circumcision.” At one point, Mathetes equates circumcision with the “lessening of the flesh.” This is important, because it gives me freedom to radically change the ritual practice of circumcision in a fantasy setting as long as it can be described as a “lessing of the flesh.”

At first blush, ritual scarring comes to mind. While this has a visceral quality to it, the minimalist in me is begging to take this idea in a completely different direction. I am already inclined to re-skin elves as Jews since they can use arcane magic in a way humans can’t (wearing armor) and are alien enough mechanically and physically to fill the role. The problem is that the whole arcane thing was meant to describe the priest-class, not the people as a whole. This is where my minimalism kicks in.

Let me first explain what I mean by minimalism: using the rules as is with as little mechanical fiddling as possible in order to emulate as many different campaign world concepts as possible. Since my default rule-set is B/X, this means finding roles within the campaign world that can be used to re-skin the extant classes of cleric, dwarf, elf, fighter, halfling, magic-user and thief. In this case, I believe I have a means if re-skinning all of the race-as-classes.

In the older editions of D&D, the three main demi-human races are all significantly shorter than humans. In B/X Dwarves average 4 feet, elves 5 to 5.5 feet and halflings only 3 feet. This can fit very nicely under the umbrella of “lessening of the flesh” especially if there were a religious ritual performed on an eight-day old child that would guarantee that it would grow up to be a dwarf, elf or halfling.

In Greek, the phrase “lessing of the flesh” can be roughly translated as μείωση της σάρκας which can be truncated to “meostarkas,” which will refer to the ritual which begins a baby’s journey to become a race-as-class.

Thus, I am not only re-skinning elves as Jews, but dwarves and halflings as well. Elves get to play the role of the priestly class. Dwarves get to be soldiers. Halflings get to be archers. All of the various racial abilities are no longer environmental evolutions, but rather gifts from God for His chosen people.

Since I am already skipping down the road of using Greek to find cool fantasy names for circumcision, I might as well do the same for naming the Jews as a whole and its three “tribes.”

• Hebrew in Greek is Εβραίος. Transliterated Evrayos, this can be contracted to Vrayos; however, for reasons you will see below, I am going to go with Vrayosi.
• Levite in Greek is λεβίτη. This can be transliterated as Leviti, but I am sore tempted to simply invert in ‘l’ and the ‘e’ to come up with Elviti, which conveniently sounds a lot like “elf.”
• Soldier in Greek is στρατιώτης. Transliterated this is Stratiotis, which I will just contract to “Strati.”
• Archer in Greek is τοξότης. This can be transliterated as “toxotis.” To rhyme it with “Vrayosi,” “Elviti,” and “Strati” this can be slightly contracted to Toxoti.

Thus, all demi-humans are called Vrayosi. Under this general term are three different tribes: the Elviti (elves), the Strati (Dwarves), and the Toxoti (Halflings).

Note: should a Vrayosi fail to go through the ritual of meostarkas, they will grow up to be human.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 3

In Chapter 3 of his Epistle to Diognetus, Mathetes makes the claim that the ritual practices of both Jews and the pagans are very similar:

…those who imagine that, by means of blood, and the smoke of sacrifices and burnt-offerings, they offer sacrifices [acceptable] to Him, and that by such honours they show Him respect, —these, by supposing that they can give anything to Him who stands in need of nothing, appear to me in no respect to differ from those who studiously confer the same honour on things destitute of sense, and which therefore are unable to enjoy such honours.

The only real difference that Mathetes sees is that the Jews recognize the true God and the pagans do not. In contrast, Mathetes claims that Christians do not share in these religious practices.
On the working hypothesis that elves are to stand in for the Jews in this campaign world, the similarity between pagan and Jewish rites suggests that both practice arcane magic (reinforcing the elf-as-Jew idea). It also bolsters the idea that the Christian/Church analog use a different kind of magic (divine).

Given the emphasis placed on sacrifice, this passage also suggests that material components ought to play a large role in the casting of arcane magic. In contrast, divine magic would have none, since Mathetes makes a big deal about how sacrificing things to the creator of all things makes no sense.

I must admit, however, that I have never been a big fan of material components save for the odd adventure where a specifically rare component is needed in order to accomplish a major goal in a campaign. While there are opportunities to add flavor to spell casting, it always felt more fiddly than it was worth.

Given that sacrifice in both pagan and Jewish rituals were fairly straight forward, most of the time (Christians got into trouble for not burning incense), I figure that the material components need not be all that complicated unless players want it to be. Thus, I would probably simply offer a generic pouch of spell components for a flat fee that would allow for, say, 50 spell levels worth of components. Given that magic-users don’t have a lot of stuff to spend money on at 1st level, I am thinking of setting the going rate at 1 or 2 gp per spell level. Thus, the paperwork involved in keeping track of material components is kept to a minimum and yet arcane magic gets to have that extra flavor and effort that further differentiates it from divine magic.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 2 Part 2

From an FRPG world-building perspective (especially D&D), this little tidbit from Chapter 2 of the Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus is pure gold:

Do ye not much more mock and insult them, when ye worship those that are made of stone and earthenware, without appointing any persons to guard them; but those made of silver and gold ye shut up by night, and appoint watchers to look after them by day, lest they be stolen?

…and there it is. Yep, it is an excuse to include dungeon-delving in the campaign setting and to use that lovely old trope of the temple, no less. Implicit in Mathetes’ accusation when placed in a world of magic and monsters is a culture that expects expeditions into temples to steal gold, treasure and even a golem or two.

I envision something akin to the shenanigans that rival colleges pull on each other during the week leading up to a football game. Fields get vandalized with the opponent's logo and mascots get stolen. In this campaign, however, it gets ramped up to a political/religious level. Imagine, for a moment, a political arena where aristocratic families vie for power and prestige through their patronage of a particular temple. The mob would be directed and influenced by a family’s ability to keep a temple flush with cash and equipped with expensive and impressive idols.

Enter the adventuring party. With the need of plausible deniability, families would farm out the job of sabotaging their rival’s temples to adventuring groups. Indeed, the family wouldn’t even really need to see a cut of the treasure, save for possibly a stolen idol or a golem.

Thus, the campaign has a built-in beginning adventure, built-in patron scheme, and a whole lot of political background noise to give players plenty of opportunity to get into all kinds of trouble.

Mathetes to Diognetus Chapter 2 Part 1

Mathetes begins the second chapter of his Epistle to Diognetus challenging the pagan about “the substance and the form of those whom ye declare and deem to be gods”:

Is not one of them a stone similar to that on which we tread? Is not a second brass, in no way superior to those vessels which are constructed for our ordinary use? Is not a third wood, and that already rotten? Is not a fourth silver, which needs a man to watch it, lest it be stolen? Is not a fifth iron, consumed by rust? Is not a sixth earthenware, in no degree more valuable than that which is formed for the humblest purposes? Are not all these of corruptible matter? Are they not fabricated by means of iron and fire? Did not the sculptor fashion one of them, the brazier a second, the silversmith a third, and the potter a fourth? Was not every one of them, before they were formed by the arts of these [workmen] into the shape of these [gods], each in its own way subject to change?

The most salient theological point is this last charge: if something is subject to change it has a beginning and an end. Should we place our hopes in things that end, we will literally be hoping in death and nothing. Christians believe that they are literally partaking of the God who has no beginning (and thus no end) for the purposes of receiving and sharing in God’s eternity. This is why early apologists harp on this point. Idol worship ultimately worships decay, disease and death since the are all indicators of change which is a fundamental characteristic of the nature of an idol.

These accusations take on an even harsher tone when placed into an FRPG where such things as golems exist. In other words, the fabricators of these idols would be magic-users capable of making facsimiles of gods who then can move and even speak under the command of those who either made or commissioned them.

This paints a picture of a power structure within the empire where the paganism isn’t a faith, but rather a ruse used by those in power to keep the masses in check through awe and fear. It also indicates that not only does Mathetes know of these machinations, but that those within the circles of power are also aware. Thus, the Christian/Church analogue is even more of an existential threat to the power structure of the empire.

To pick up on yesterday's post, it seems that the easiest solution to a pagan priestly class is that of magic-user, where arcane magic is a closely guarded secret of the upper classes. The Wizard’s Guild could be akin to the eunuchs of the Forbidden City in imperial China. In order for the hoi polloi to access to the secrets and powers of arcane magic, one must renounce family and the ability to reproduce. Outside of possibly the upper echelons of the aristocracy, this would mean female magic-users would be virtually nonexistent (and why female clerics may be far more prevalent within the Christianity/Church analogue than one might normally expect).

The other implication here is that stone, brass, wood, iron, clay, silver and gold (which is mentioned later in the chapter) golems not only exist, but are commonplace in temples. This would necessitate the creation of new golem types (like silver and gold) and classes of golems that would be vulnerable to certain types of attacks or magic (so that they could be reasonably dealt with by lower-level adventurers without doling out magic weapons). One possibility is to classify lesser golems as subject to a Cleric’s Turn Undead ability under the assumption that necromancy and dead body parts play a larger role in the cheaper/lower quality types of golems.

Mathetes to Diognetus: Chapter 1 Part 2

In his opening statement to Diognetus, Mathetes acknowledges “the most excellent Diognetus” and that he is “exceedingly desirous” to learn:

what form of religion [Christians] observe so as all to look down upon the world itself and despise death

In context of an FRPG (especially D&D), this is a very juicy quote.

From a Christian POV, death deserves to be despised because Christ overcame death by death on the Cross:

O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? —1 Cor 15:55

In a world where death can be overcome through undeath via arcane means, the despising of death comes with it a whole new set of possibilities.

Imagine, for a moment, that the slave economy found in an ancient Rome were powered, not by human labor, but by undead labor. Then imagine there arose a religion whose practitioners not only could Turn and Destroy Undead but saw undeath as heinous. Imagine that they insist that the body is an integral part of the human person and that every human person is valuable, unique and unrepeatable. This would lead to an explosive situation where the Roman Empire analogue is going to see the Christianity/Church analogue as an existential threat.

This implies that the Turn Undead mechanic is exclusive to Christian clerics. This would necessitate re-skinning other classes to be pagan and Jewish priests or the creation of two whole new classes to fill these roles.

Some initial thoughts:

• The 5E Warlock would do nicely as a pagan priest-class.
• One could replace the Turn Undead mechanic with a “Lay on Hands” type of ability that would siphon hp from the pagan priest to their target. This could also be used offensively to siphon hp from victims to heal the priest. This would fit with the suggested necromantic/undead theme. I would also fiddle with spell lists.
• One could also just require that pagan priests be anti-clerics and that Turn Undead is actually Control Undead and that they have to cast all the reverse spells within the Cleric spell list.
• Pathfinder has introduced the idea of a Sorcerer who casts divine spells. In 1E this is the Oracle and in 2E the sorcerer’s bloodline can grant access to the divine spell list. This would be an interesting way to emulate the Jewish priest class. In B/X, by trading out the use of armor and weapons and limiting the number of spells known, a divine sorcerer could have access to spells at 1st level and be more of a spell-oriented class.
• Since I am unlikely to find any references to suggest the existence of demi-humans, it might be interesting to re-skin elves as Jews.

Finally, if necromancy is so prevalent within the Empire, would the reason that citizens worship the Emperor as a God-King is the fact that the Emperor has actually embraced undeath as a lich as has been ruling for many generations? How common would undeath be among aristocratic families?

Mathetes to Diognetus: Chapter 1 Part 1

In the 1st Chapter of the Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus, our author seeks to distinguish Christianity from both Paganism and Judaism. From a world-building perspective this means that we have three main religions within the Empire:

• Paganism, which is the state-sponsored religion.
• Judaism, which is tolerated by the Empire.
• Christianity, which is seen as a threat by both the pagans and the Jews

Historically, Rome saw their Emperors as gods and it was a civic duty to offer sacrifices (usually incense) at the idols of the emperor. This is what got so many Christians in trouble — they were accused of being traitors to the empire.

As a side-note, if one reads the hagiographies of the Great Martyrs from the first three centuries of Christianity, the most common means of death was beheading. This is significant because death by decapitation was the death of a citizen — because it was seen as swift and merciful. Thus, when a Roman official had a martyr beheaded, there was an implicit admission that the Christians were falsely accused of being traitors — they were citizens.

Judaism was tolerated by Rome because the Jews had no real political aspirations that were seen as a threat. Indeed, Jews sought to separate themselves from the general population and were happy to live out their lives with as little interference in the workings of the Empire as possible. Of note, the word “holy” literally means to set apart. So, the Jews understood their non-participation in the culture around them as an integral part of living a religious and holy life.

Christianity was a threat to the pagans not only because they refused to burn incense at the idols of the emperor, but because one of the titles of Christ is King. Thus, unlike the Jews, Christians were perceived to have political aspirations that were in direct conflict with the empire at large.

Christianity was a threat to the Jews for both political and religious reasons. Politically, the manner in which the Christians interpreted Scripture (which largely meant the O.T. during this period) threatened the power structures of Jewish society. Gone were the ritual laws that kept the priestly and political class flush with money and power. From a religious perspective, the Christians were actively seeking converts among the Gentiles. This flew in the face of the entire concept of what they understood to be holy. Additionally, should the empire ever have conflated Christianity with Judaism, the tolerance enjoyed by the Jews from the Empire could have rapidly eroded.

This opens up three distinct approaches to framing a campaign:

• The characters are primarily pagan. One of the main background noises would be the rise of the Christianity/Church analogue. As players investigate the rumors, they come to find that the rumors are almost entirely false. I could easily foresee a moment when the party looks at themselves and asks, “Are we the baddies?”
• The characters are primarily Jewish. This would largely involve discovering and dealing with threats to the protected status that Jews have within the empire. I could see this being a mission oriented campaign largely filled with information gathering and even some spy work.
• The characters are primarily Christian. This campaign would turn my usual archetypal campaign structure on its ear. I normally run (Christian) Civilization vs. (Demonic) Wilderness that fits nicely into the Law vs. Chaos alignment structure of B/X. In this case it would be (Christian) Wilderness vs. (Demonic) Civilization. This could potentially see an urban environment-as-megadungeon structure with the dungeon areas (catacombs) being the safe havens.

It should be noted that while Christian characters could fit reasonable well within all three campaigns, that can’t really be said about pagan or Jewish characters.

As a final note, as I write this, I am finding the need to come up with names for the various fantasy analogs that are making up this campaign. I don’t want to do that willy, nilly, however. I would prefer to use the text of the Epistle to inspire. I’ll wait and see what the text prompts me to do.

Mathetes to Diognetus: Introduction

Before I actually dive into the actual text of The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus, there is a lot of juicy information for world-building from the Introduction, which gives some historical background and context. Of interest to me is that we do not know who actually wrote this letter. The author is called “Mathetes” because he describes himself as a Disciple, which in Greek is Mathetes. For the purposes of world-building, this gives me a lot of freedom to assume the personage of the writer and to build whatever background I want for the needs of the campaign world.

Of note, though, scholars have floated the following figures as possible authors (though most have been rejected):

• Justin Martyr: a 2nd Century Christian apologist, philosopher and teacher from Rome.
• Clement of Rome: Bishop of Rome from A.D. 88-99 and author of several Epistles that were considered for inclusion in the N.T. but were rejected because he was too far removed from the Apostles.
• Apollos: a Jewish Christian and co-worker of Paul mentioned several times in the N.T. who was important to the development of the churches in Ephesus and Corinth.

The most important piece of information that can be gleaned from the introduction (from a world-building perspective), however, is the hypothesis on who Diognetus is. While there seems to be some disagreement among scholars as to who the recipient of the letter is, both the original editor and the editor of the updated version (“N.B.”) seem convinced that Diognetus refers to a tutor of Marcus Aurelius, who was Emperor of Rome from A.D. 161-180. This places the letter in the first part of the 2nd Century because Diognetus was tutor of the future emperor until about A.D. 132-133. Diognetus was a master painter and encouraged Aurelius to pursue philosophy.

This tasty tidbit tells us several things about this nascent campaign-world:

• There is an Empire.
• The Empire is pagan.
• Philosophy and art are important to the upper echelons of society.
• The Christian/Church analogue is large and influential enough to garner the attention of the inner circle of the imperial family.

It also leaves me with several questions I will need to be answering as this project goes along:

• Is the time-frame of the campaign to take place before or after the departure of Diognetus as tutor?
• If before, is Diognetus (and therefore other members of the imperial household?) sympathetic in their interest in the Church or is there a more sinister motivation?
• If after, is Diognetus still alive and, if so, is the reason he left the imperial household because he embraced the Church? If dead, was his interest found out and the reason for his execution?

Something Different

In the Orthodox Church, Advent begins on November 15th. While not as rigorous as Great Lent, it is still a time of fasting and prayer. (I highly recommend this approach, by the way, it radically reduces Christmas burnout and fatigue and I have found that over the years, Christmas has become one of my favorite holidays).Thus, during this period of the year, I do my best to live life a little more ascetically and spiritually. One way that I do that is to find a Church Father I have yet to read and take a deep dive.

This being the first Saturday of Advent, it occurred to me that I have not blogged in almost six months. Part of this was due to some personal health issues and the fact that I haven’t really been all that interested in or inspired to think about gaming. When I cracked open Volume 1 of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, however, I had a rather interesting thought: What if I used one of the letters found within that volume as source material for an FRPG world-build?

So, for the rest of Advent, I will endeavor to extrapolate an entire campaign idea from a letter written some 1700-1800 years ago. For those interested in the actual source material I will be using, you can find it online here:

The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus

Saintly Saturday: St. Cyril of Alexandria Revisited

Today is the feast of St. Cyril of Alexandria. I have been writing this blog long enough that I am having to go back and check if I have already written stuff about various saints. And I have written about St. Cyril before. To quote myself:

Today is the feast of St. Cyril of Alexandria. Born into a Christian family of means, he grew up studying science, philosophy and Holy Scripture. In his youth, he became a monk and was later chosen to be Patriarch of Alexandria in A.D. 412.

St. Cyril looms large in the politics and Christological controversies of the 5th century. For anyone who is interested in history, this is a fascinating chapter in life of the Church. Heresy (most notably Nestorianism), political rivalries, rivalries between bishops, Ecumenical Councils, the Robber Council, violence and exile all swirl around the life of St. Cyril. He was the primary advocate of the orthodox position against Nestorius at the Third Ecumenical Council and though he died in A.D. 444, his theology played a large role at the Fourth Ecumenical Council in Chalcedon in A.D. 451. Ironically, both those who accepted and rejected the Council of Chalcedon hold up St. Cyril as their champion.

There is a very rich history here, both historically and theologically that can be mined for all kinds of things; however, I want to return to St. Cyril because of something that is happening outside our hobby.

I take great interest in apologetics and one of the more interesting Christian apologists on Youtube is a fellow named David Wood. I initially took interest in him because, like me, he comes to Christianity from an atheist background; however, his main interest is Islam. His best friend and roommate in college was Muslim and the two (both being on the debate team) took great interest in trying to convince the other that their religion is incorrect. In the end, David’s friend became a Christian.

Currently, there is a series of videos being released on Wood’s channel called Islamize Me. The series is inspired by the movie Super Size Me where a documentarian decided to see what would happen to his health after eating only fast-food for a month. Wood and some of his friends pretend to become Muslim to see what the effects would be after a month. Given all of the various oddities one can find in Islamic sources, this series comes across as comedy with a sizable dose of biting satire.

Other Christian apologists have been questioning and even condemning Wood’s approach, claiming that Christians just don’t do that sort of thing. To which I respond with this quote from St. Cyril of Alexandria:

This is nothing but foolishness and stupidity, the frenzy of a crazed mind. – On the Unity of Christ

When one bothers to read the apologetic works of the Church Fathers, one will frequently find insults like this one. It is all part of the rhetorical style of their era, when debate was as much entertainment as it was serious and purposeful.

I mention this because for so long we Christians have been told that we have no place in this hobby from both fellow Christians and people within the hobby. One of the main reasons I started this blog was to thumb my nose at this notion, inspired by the likes of St. Cyril.

If a saint can defend the nature of Christ and the Gospel by declaring that the ideas of his theological opponent are the foolish frenzy of a crazed mind, surely I can play RPGs from a Christian point of view and create gaming material that speaks to that world view.

Not surprisingly, I have had a lot of fun along the way, produced more stuff than I ever thought possible and have been able to meet a plethora of good folks out there in the hobby who I’d gladly spend an evening rolling some dice with.

In the end, it goes to show that God gave us everything we have and that with Him is it possible to give Him glory using everything that He gave us, including RPGs, humor, satire and even the odd insult.

Gamer ADD: Toward and Old School version of 5e Part 2

One of the things that drives me batty about 5e has nothing to do with either the system or the mechanics. I really despise the presentation and layout. Awhile ago, I did an experiment to see if I could to a “Player’s Guide” for my Lost Colonies campaign world for 5e. It was a nightmare. Trying to figure out what a class can do at any given level is a chore that can result in looking up several different references in different parts of the rulebook. The process was so headache-inducing that I gave up trying.

When my Gamer ADD-addled brain started thinking about treading down the 5e road again, I did not want the published core books (or any other books) involved. Dealing with just the SRD (while still too complicated in its presentation) makes things easier to deal with.

Thus, when thinking about an Old School Hack of 5e, I want the presentation to be simple and easy to digest. One easy editorial decision that will make that process easier is to limit the number of levels covered in the game. 0e covers Fighters and Clerics up to 10th level and Magic-users to 16th. I have been playing this game since 1979 and I have only seen two characters make it to 9th level. I played one (a bard in 3.5 that retired at 9th level) and the other was a PC in my Lost Colonies Campaign (LL). Thus, from a practice experience POV, having a game only cover levels 1-10 seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Of course, my experience is almost exclusively with xp being awarded according to older rule-sets where xp is not only harder to come by, but 1xp=1gp is the primary means of gaining xp (and in some cases it’s Arneson’s 1xp=1gp spent). Thus, in order to make levels 1-10 feel like a complete game, the xp needed for each level is going to need a slight overhaul.

In 0e an 11th level Magic-user needs 300,000xp. Conveniently, if one were to use that number for the xp needed to get to 10th level, halving that for each level (effectively doubling the xp needed for each level) the xp needed to get to 2nd ends up being 1000. This number is half as much as what is needed in older editions of the game (thus, making leveling faster/easier for the modern gamer context) but is much higher than the 300 needed in 5e as written (which helps placate my own old school proclivities).

Given this info, here is a rough draft of the kind of layout I have in mind for this project:

Yes. That is ONE page for everything needed to play a fighter from 1st-10th level.

Note that there are a couple of changes from the SRD for the fighter:

• The Proficiency Bonus progresses slightly faster. I did this to make Fighters better at fighting in the long-term than Clerics and Magic-users.
• I replaced the 7th level Martial Archetype power “Remarkable Athlete” with the mechanics of the 7th level Barbarian ability “Feral Instinct” — advantage on initiative. I did this to keep the fighter class more focused on fighting prowess.
• I replaced the Martial Archetype power at 10th level with an Extra Attack (which would be granted normally at 11th level). Again, I did this to keep the focus of the class on fighting prowess.

Gamer ADD: Toward an Old-School version of 5e

As I mentioned in my last Saintly Saturday post, my Gamer ADD-addled brain is busy editing the 5e SRD to reflect my own old-school proclivities. At the end of the day, though, I am not all that interested in editing it beyond the bounds of what could be called 5e D&D or to tie it so closely to a game world as to effectively create a new D&D-esque game with a little 5e sprinkled on top.

An (excellent) example would be Mithgarthr. For all intents and purposes it is 5e D&D; however, there are enough world-specific races and classes and unique mechanics that it deserves to be its own game. As much as I admire the folks at Mithgarthr Entertainment for producing a version of 5e that I’ve been sore tempted to buy in hardcover (something WotC has never even come close to doing), my goal is to produce something both far more generic and compatible.

In other words, what I want is a version of 5e that can be easily used regardless of what campaign world the end user wants for the their game table and that can be used (with very little effort) in conjunction with the 5e rules as written. I use the caveat “with very little effort” because, in order to scratch my curmudgeonly old-school itch, there will necessarily be some alterations to classes that will deviate slightly from the rules as written.

Speaking of classes, I will pick up on an idea I first posited here — there will be only three classes:

1. Clerics (using the rules for Paladins)
2. Fighters
3. Magic-users (using the rules for Warlocks)

Additionally, I will only use ideas/spells/powers from the SRD to describe these three classes. Thus, there is no need for detailing different oaths, archetypes or patrons. This will simplify the typesetting and presentation of each class immensely.

For those who are wondering why only three classes, there are two main thrusts to my thinking:

Firstly, 0e only had these three classes. By sticking to that pattern, it gives this modern version of D&D an old-school feel.

Secondly (and possibly even more importantly), all of the other classes are redundant:

• Barbarians and Rangers are fighters with specific backgrounds and tactical proclivities that don’t really need any mechanics to express.
• Bards are entertainers and there is an entertainer background. Thus, one could be a bard in any class and thus a specific class with specific mechanics aren’t all that necessary.
• Druids, Clerics and Paladins are really all the same class with slightly different foci. Using a bit of background and role-playing choices, one can easily emulate all three with one set of mechanics (the Paladin Class being my choice because it is the one that most closely resembles the cleric of older editions of the game)
• Sorcerers, Warlocks and Wizards are also really the same class that primarily differ on where magic comes from. That can easily be explained through special effects and world-building concepts. Especially since Cantrips in 5e can be cast at will, there is very little mechanically difference between these classes.
• Rogues have always been the skill-heavy class. 5e gives access to all kinds of interesting skills and proficiencies through backgrounds. One can choose an appropriate background with any class and function as a thief-like character.
• Monks have always felt a bit out of place in D&D because they have a definitive Wuxia feel to them that is a bit alien to the average high-fantasy D&D campaign world. At the same time, they don’t really do Wuxia justice. If one really wanted to do a Wuxia-style game using a 5e D&D chassis, backgrounds would be a much better way to build that world than relying on the Monk class.

Thus, the original three classes married to a robust background system can easily emulate all the other classes found in 5e.

Saintly Saturday: St. Cornelius the Abbot of Komel

Today is the Feast of St. Cornelius the Abbot of Komel, Vologda. Born into a boyar family in the 15th century, his brother Lukian served at the court of the Great Prince of Moscow. Both brothers decided to enter into monasticism at the monastery of St. Cyril of White Lake (how cool is that name!?).

Desiring for a more solitary life, St. Cornelius left White Lake to enter other monasteries, but eventually chose to live in the inhospitable environs of the Komel forest. Other monks began to gather around him and in 1501 he built a wooden church dedicated to the Entrance of the Theotokos. By 1512, the brethren had grown so numerous that he built a stone church and compiled a Monastic Rule based on those written by Sts. Joseph of Volokolamsk and Nilus of Sora.

St. Cornelius died at the age of 82 on May 19, 1537.

As I explained in this seven-year-old (!?) post, there are two basic forms of monasticism: cenobitic (communal) and eremitic (hermit-like). The monastic rules found in Russia tend to be of a third type: the skete. It takes elements of both eremitic practices, allowing for the isolation of individual monks, and cenobitic practices, allowing for a community of monks to live in close proximity.

In other words, there really is no single “right way” to be a monastic. Depending upon the individual and the relationships that individual forms, one can be called to be a part of several different styles of monasticism. Indeed, many monastic saints, St. Cornelius included, practice several different types over the course of their lifetime.

In the comment section of my last Saintly Saturday post, there was a joke about edition wars in D&D. Admittedly, when I first started to blog about RPGs, I wrote several serious criticisms of “new-school” D&D and I will openly admit that the idea of playing 3e, 3.5e, Pathfinder or 4e sounds about as much fun as doing some major dental work. Today, however, I won’t begrudge (too much) someone else’s fun. Sure, I believe they would have more fun at my table and the way I like to play, but I also know from experience that isn’t a universal rule I can depend upon.

I have argued that we live in a Golden Age for RPGs. One of the reasons for that is that we, as players, have at our finger tips 0e-5e D&D and all the various clones of those editions out there to choose from and hack ourselves for our particular proclivities and our particular needs. In the same way monks have a plethora of opportunities to pursue the ascetic life, we gamers have a plethora of choices as to which rules we want to bring to the table to have fun with.

Recently Eric of Tenkar’s Tavern reported that WotC estimates that there are 12 to 15 million D&D players in North America and that there was a 44% growth for the D&D brand in 2016. Note that this is just the brand, not a specific edition. While I will openly admit that most of the growth can probably be attributed to 5e (and that is not a bad thing), I am guessing that no small percentage of that comes from older editions. Else, why does WotC keep on churning out publications for older editions in both PDF and POD forms? There was a time when I thought such a move by WotC would never happen and I cannot tell you how happy I am that they continue to open up that library.

In other words: play the version of D&D that you want to play and have fun! If that version doesn’t exist, make it! Today, we have so many tools at our disposal to do just that, we barely have an excuse not to.

To that end, one of my episodes of Gamer ADD which I have been subject to of late, was due to the WotC news Eric reported. I like the concept of 5e, but I don’t like its presentation, its editing or the relative complexity of the rules as they exist today. Erik took what were really simple rules (S&W White Box) and stripped them down as much as possible to still have a game we would recognize as D&D and S&W: SWL and SWCL. My Gamer ADD-addled brain thought why can’t I do that for 5e?

Thus, one of my wayward projects is editing the 5e SRD down to a rules-lite version of the game which I would gladly play and even Referee. Hopefully, I’ll have some presentable stuff done sooner rather than later to share.

Gamer ADD: Black Pudding Cleric Hack

My life has been extremely busy of late and on top of that, my overtaxed brain has been busy screaming, "squirrel!" Thus, I have several ideas half-formed in the last several weeks that I am trying my best to at least roughly shape out so that I or others can use them.

To that end, if you haven't checked out Black Pudding #4 by J.V. West under the Random Order Creations moniker, do yourself a favor and do so. Every issue of this fanzine irreverently enhances the goodness that is B/X with a loving 1970s-esque kitschy wonder that has me both giggling and itching to play. Black Pudding #4 has a hack of B/X using elements of 5e, LL, S&W with just the right amount of cool. It is a hack I would play in a heartbeat; however, there is one glaring hole, at least for my particular proclivities. Clerics don't get the Black Pudding treatment.

Therefore, I endeavored to make my own so that when the day comes and I find myself at a table willing to embrace that wacky coolness that is the Black Pudding OSR Playbook, I'll be ready to add my own bit of the ridiculous (in a very good way).

For those interested, I created a single page that can be printed off and added to the Black Pudding OSR Playbook:

The file can be found here. Enjoy!

Saintly Saturday: St. Dionysius the Archimandrite of St. Sergius Monastery

Today is the Feast of St. Dionysius the Archimandrite of St. Sergius Monastery. Born in 1570, St. Dionysius was the head of the Staritsky Dormition monastery (northwest of Moscow) and then, beginning in 1611, St. Sergius Monastery (northeast of Moscow). He died in 1633. Thus, he lived through the entirety of the Time of Troubles, an era plagued by succession wars, foreign invasions and famine. He was foremost aid to St. Hermogenes, Patriarch of Moscow who himself was imprisoned by Polish-Lithuanian invaders who sought to impose Catholicism on the Russians. St. Dionysius also set up a house and hospice for the injured, sick and homeless. He also ordered that his own monks distribute the best food they had to the poor while surviving on the left-overs.

Dionysius himself was jailed. Ironically, it was by his fellow Orthodox and not the Catholics. During the chaos of the Times of Trouble, discrepancies began showing up in service books. Therefore, Dionysius got involved in trying to remedy the situation by comparing current editions with both ancient Slavic texts and Greek texts. Without understanding what he was doing, the local officials accused him of heresy at Council in 1618. At the intervention of Patriarchs of both Moscow and Jerusalem, he was released and reinstated in 1619.

He is buried at St. Sergius Monastery.

For those who like to put a bunch of politics in their campaigns to create adventure ideas, interesting background noise and opportunities for players to have a huge impact on the campaign world, the Time of Troubles is excellent source material. The Time of Troubles refers to the years in-between the death of the last Tsar of the Rurik Dynasty in 1598 and the establishment of the Romanov Dynasty in 1613. There are several events that could provide center-pieces for major campaign events:

• The last Rurik Tsar, Feodor, is described as being “mentally-challenged” and the realm was actually being run by his brother-in-law, the boyar Boris Godunov.
• Prior to Feodor’s death, his younger brother Dmitri was assassinated in mysterious circumstances (some suspect at the order of Godunov).
• Upon the death of Feodor, Godunov was elected Tsar; however, his reign is plagued by problems.
• From 1601-1603 summer temperatures at night in Russia fell below freezing, killing crops. One third of the population starved to death.
• Brigands freely roamed the countryside.
• Tartars began raiding the southern borders.
• The princes balked at the idea of taking orders from a mere boyar (akin to a Duke or Earl taking orders from a Baron). Conspiracies against the new Tsar abounded.
• Godunov was painted as an usurper and rumors that Feodor’s younger brother Dmitri was still alive and in hiding.
• False Dmitris started to declare themselves and were supported by both the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Catholic) and the Kingdom of Sweden (Protestant) to justify getting involved in a series of succession wars and political assassinations.

In the end, all of this foreign meddling (especially the attempts to impose Catholicism) united the Russians as a people across classes and out of the ashes rose what became the Russian Empire.

This sounds like the perfect place to drop a bunch of creative players to see what kind of mischief could be done…

Saintly Saturday: St. Maximian Patriarch of Constantinople

Today is the Feast of St. Maximian, Patriarch of Constantinople. He was born in Rome of wealthy parents and used his inheritance to provide tombs for those who led holy lives. He preferred a simple, unadorned life, which actually caught the attention of Sisinius, who was Patriarch of Constantinople from A.D. 426-427. Maximian was ordained as a priest. After the heretic Nestorius was deposed as Patriarch of Constantinople in A.D. 431, St. Maximian replaced him. He then died peacefully in A.D. 434.

In a round about way, the life of St. Maximian reminds of one of the more influential books in my own personal Appendix N: The Seven Altars of Dûsarra by Lawrence Watt-Evans. In this particular tale, the protagonist is sent off to steal whatever is on the seven altars from the title of the book. Each altar was from a different temple dedicated to one of the “Lords of Dûs” — gods of darkness.

In a reverse of this structure, a campaign inspired by St. Maximian might center around the idea of seven lost temples. In the high days of Civilization, during the reign of a Maximian-like ruler or religious leader, great temples dedicated to the saints (literally “holy ones”) were built all across the Empire. When the Empire collapsed, seven of the greatest of these temples were “lost” — they now lie in lands claimed by the forces of Chaos.

The locations of some are well known (i.e. the ones corresponding to lower level adventures) while the locations of others are lost to the mists of time (and/or might have been moved by some great feat of magic which may very well have been the catalyst for the collapse of the Empire).

The campaign, then, would center around the recovery of seven relics, each associated with one of the seven temples. Fill in your favorite trope here as to why these relics need to be recovered. One that I might be tempted to use is that should all seven be joined together something extremely powerful can be made and various factions have recently come upon the blueprints to make it all possible. Thus, everyone is in a race to secure all seven relics.

Saintly Saturday: the Holy Martyrs Anthony, John and Eustathius of Lithuania

Today is the feast of the Holy Martyrs Anthony, John and Eustathius of Lithuania. During the reign of Prince Olgerd, these brothers became Orthodox Christians due to the influence of Princess Maria Yaroslavna, Oglerd’s wife. After her death, however, Olgerd turned toward paganism and persecuted the Christians. Imprisoned and tortured, they were all hung from an oak considered sacred by the pagans. Later, the Christians built a church at the site and the stump of the tree became the altar.

This all took place during what can called the Northern Crusades, a fascinating and criminally ignored history. Beginning in the 13th century, Bishop Albert of Riga founded a military order called the Livonian Brothers of the Sword (sometimes referred to as the Sword Brethren). Sanctioned by Pope Innocent III, this group of German warrior-monks were established to aid in the Christianization of the pagans in what today is Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Politically, they were there to aid Albert carve out a fiefdom granted to him by Philip of Swabia who laid claim to be Emperor of the Hohenstaufen Holy Roman Empire.

In the end, they suffered high casualties and were absorbed into the Teutonic Order as an autonomous branch called the Livonian Order. It was this order which clashed with the Alexander Nevsky-led Novgorod forces at the Battle on the Ice — so-called because in the swampy environs of the Baltics, winter was campaign season because the frozen ground was the best time to move troops. Lake Peipus was frozen over and was perfect for a calvary charge.

In terms of influential movies on me, Sergei Eisenstein’s Alexander Nevsky has a pull than is even stronger than Star Wars. I saw both in my youth and both have lasting visual, emotional and musical impressions that still resonate will me today. I don’t think I would have been as enthusiastic a D&D player as I still am today without Alexander Nevsky.

This time period is ripe for using as campaign fodder. Take a look at this map:

You have competing bishops, competing denominations of Christianity, you have militaristic monastic order, pagans and lurking off the map the Golden Horde ready to wreck havoc. I would love to see the chaos caused by a group of players in a political situation like this.

As an aside, for those who argue there are no historical examples of the D&D cleric, look no further than this period of history where the concept of the “battle bishop” is not very far from the truth.

Rinn's Journal Part 4

Thirdday, 7 Februa

O God, help me! Penael is dead.

Fourthday, 8 Februa

It always surprises me at how cathartic a funeral is, especially the one we had for Panael. Rufus specifically thanked me for taking such good care of Panael’s body. Given the fate he faced had the Thanati worm taken hold, things could have been much worse. I prevented more pain. That these people have suffered so much to take comfort in death is amazing.

Now that I am past self-pity, I have begun to realize that Panael sacrificed himself that I might live and that as such, I owe him and his people my life and all that I am. Through him, Isten has finally made me comfortable about this calling for this city and these people.

We can no longer call where the hobgoblins and spiders are a “lair,” there is a far larger complex below than we ever imagined. When we followed what Cuinn called “heavy traffic,” we found a huge room with what amounts to river running through it. There was a bridge crossing the flowing water in the middle of the space and on the other side was an encampment of hobgoblins.

Morivam promised that he could incapacitate several of their number with a spell, so we decided to charge. Unfortunately, these hobgoblins were combat veterans and organized themselves quickly. Panael took a spear meant for me and as a consequence opened himself up to another. Despite Panael’s sacrifice, Morivam’s spell was too much for them and the few that remained fled.

We tried to to pursue, but the passage they retreated down proved to be a maze of natural caverns and any chase through them was deemed too dangerous. While I chopped off Panael’s head with his own sword to prevent the Thanati worm from taking hold of him, the rest of our party took stock of what the Hobgoblins had managed to smuggle beneath the city.

There were enough weapons to arm a large raid including saddles and horse tack branded with the sign of a wolf howling at the moon. There was even a long dead corpse armed with a falchion and suited in a bronze breastplate. I surmise that these items may very well have been booty from a raid either from some other group inside the city, or perhaps from before the hobgoblins slinked into Redwraith.

Given the wounds and casualties we suffered, it was decided that we retreat for now.

Fifthday, 9 Februa

The others have continued their raid into the complex. Given the loss of Panael, I could not bring myself to join them. At the moment, I am the only real protection the faithful have here in Redwraith. We decided to take the hobgoblin’s equipment and use it as an emergency stash for the church itself. Blaise and Mirela helped me to secure a large number of bricks and mortar. I have spent large amounts of my time, with intermittent help of various members of the church, to start building walls around the sunken courtyard in front of the church proper. At the very least, we will have a better defensive position and someplace to retreat to in an emergency.

I must admit, however, that I find such simple work to be restful for my spirit, if not my body.

Sixthday, 10 Februa

I am beginning to worry. No one has returned from the raid on the spiders and the hobgoblins. I did give Cuinn one my healing potions in case someone got hurt since I would not be there to minister any wounds. Still, what is taking so long?

SWCL Adventure Module: The Burnt Village of the Restless Dead

I have slowly been working on my own version of The Temple of Elemental Evil for use with SWCL. Rather than releasing it all at once, I have created the moniker Adventure Tools. This allows me to release each finished section as its own adventure that can be modularly added on to any campaign or any megadungeon. The first release can be found here.

This release is a bit unusual in that it is a surface encounter area that leads to a dungeon rather than a part of the dungeon itself. I will be interested to see if and how this gets used.

As is normal for me, this comes with the disclaimer that I am a hobbyist and have edited this as best as I am able, but there will be mistakes. Please consider the comment section a thread for any typos etc. that you catch. Thank you!

The module can be found here.

Christ is Risen!

Be illumined, illumined, O New Jerusalem; for the glory of the Lord has arisen over you. Dance now for joy, O Zion, and exult. And you be merry, O pure Theotokos, at the arising of the One you bore. — Ode IX of the Canon of Pascha

A Quick Update

I had a few people reach out to me to see if I am okay, especially since I was quiet on Easter.

Firstly, I am fine, just insanely busy. What time I have had for gaming has been dedicated to actual play and trying to get the second installment of Adventure Tools finished. Thus, the blog has been neglected. Hopefully this will change in the near future.

Secondly, for those who are not aware, this past Sunday was Palm Sunday for me and mine. Orthodox Christianity uses a different calendar than Western Christendom and the Sundays we celebrate what we call Pascha can very wildly. This year we are one week later. Thus, for those looking for the "Christ is Risen!" post, that will be posted this coming Sunday.

Finally, thanks for the concern. It means a lot.

Holmes & Cook: Monk Redux (Saintly Saturday)

Today is the Feast of St. Quadratus of Nicomedia. He was from a rich family and spared no expense helping fellow Christians imprisoned for their faith during the reign of Emperor Decius (A.D. 249-251). When Decius sent his proconsul Perennius to persecute the Christians in Nicomedia, Quadrates voluntarily appeared before him. The saint wanted to encourage those in prison by demonstrating his courage in the face of certain torture and death.

These, of course, followed. In the end, a fire was lit under an iron grate in order to burn Quadratus to death. After the iron was red hot, the saint voluntarily laid down as if he were crawling into bed, unharmed by the heat and fire. Out of sheer frustration, the proconsul had the saint beheaded.

This past week I posted about a possible “Western” version of the monk for my Holmes + Cook thought experiment using the Turning mechanic as a means of fitting the concept into the idea of a cleric subclass. It produced some really interesting comments.

One theme was to make the monk a “buffing” class and the bard was cited as an example. While I think this is quite an excellent idea, my Holmes + Cook thought experiment already has a buff-type class. My suggested version of the Paladin is as a leader-type that has a floating bonus that can be added to various party members. Thus, to have the monk do the same through Turning would be to blur the lines between the two.

That being said, the story of St. Quadratus is a clear example of the type of miracles that inspired the cleric spell Resist Fire and suggests that JB’s idea that the monk be an “inward channeling” character might be a very interesting way to go. In other words, instead of buffing others (like my Holmesian Paladin), the monk uses faith to push himself beyond normal physical boundaries.

Here is a list of cleric spells from Cook that could possibly fit the bill:

• Cure Light Wounds (1st level)
• Remove Fear (1st level)
• Resist Cold (1st level)
• Resist Fire (2nd level)
• Silence 15’r (2nd level) — in a nod to the idea of Cadfael and Friar Tuck having thief skills
• Cure Disease (3rd level)
• Remove Curse (3rd level)
• Striking (3rd level)

As I have pointed out before, both Holmes and Cook have eight different types of targets for a cleric’s Turn Undead ability. Above is a list of eight special effects. The question is, what order of difficulty should each of these effects have in terms of the Turning mechanic?

If one were to duplicate the Turn Table exactly as it appears in Cook and replace each undead type with a spell effect from the above list, I would propose the following (from easiest to most difficult):

1. Remove Fear
2. Resist Cold
3. Cure Light Wounds
4. Silence
5. Resist Fire
6. Striking
7. Cure Disease
8. Remove Curse

This way all the first level spell effects are available immediately, with the most useful/powerful (Cure Light Wounds) being the hardest to accomplish. The most powerful 3rd level spell (Remove Curse, in my opinion) would be available at 5th level (approximately when 3rd and 4th level spells become available to a cleric at 6th level).

I would place some kind of limit on how many times each of these abilities can to used over the course of an adventure. Once per encounter? A set number of times per day/ per adventure?
Otherwise, a monk at 11+ level would be able to do all of these abilities at will and that seems way too much to me.

Since these Turning abilities are spell-like abilities, I would remove the spell-casting abilities of the monk, but leave their fighting ability alone.

Thoughts?

Holmes & Cook: Monk

The last subclass that I have to muse about in my Holmes & Cook thought experiment is the monk. Holmes categorizes the monk as a subclass of the cleric. Given my reasoning behind using the Turning mechanism to re-skin the druid, this leads me down the path of trying to marry the mechanic with the concept of “monk.”

This is where I will be departing quite radically from the traditional view of the monk as wuxia in D&D. When one uses the word monk, there are two archetypes that stand above all others: Shaolin and Benedictine. Understandably, D&D opted for the former because the latter, being a non-martial contemplative, doesn’t really fit with the whole dungeon delving schtick of Dungeons and Dragons. While it isn’t a perfect fit, at least a Shaolin is trained to fight.

Given my own proclivities, however, and the concept of the cleric being so heavily influenced by Christian archetypes in earlier versions of D&D such as Holmes, I have a hard time seeing a Shaolin monk as a subclass of the Christian-influenced cleric. Indeed, when AD&D was published, the monk was completely divorced from the cleric class. My friends and I always classified it as a subclass of the thief. Thus, I am much more inclined to lean toward a fantasy version of the Benedictine.

The first thing to decide is what effect a western-style monk might have access to. If one breaks down the Benedictine Rule to its fundamentals they are work and pray. The first deals with the mundane while the second asks for the miraculous. One thing I know that monks are praying for all the time is health. Therefore, I am going to explore the possibility of healing as the basis of a monk' s Turning mechanic.

In Cook there are six healing-type spells: Cure Light Wounds, Cure Disease, Remove Curse, Cure Serious Wounds, Neutralize Poison and Raise Dead. Since tying healing to Turning is going to be quite powerful, I am willing to eliminate Raise Dead with the justification that a monk’s Turning ability only works on the living. This leaves us with five special effects.

Both Holmes and Cook have eight target types in their Turn Tables. Thus, there needs to be an additional three healing effects. Since Cure Light Wounds uses a d8, the three other categories can use small die types: d2, d4 and d6.

Thus the Turning categories of the monk might look like this:

• Cure 1d2 hp
• Cure 1d4 hp
• Cure 1d6 hp
• Cure 1d8 hp
• Cure Disease
• Remove Curse
• Cure 2d8
• Neutralize Poison

Once per encounter, a monk could attempt to effect 2d6 targets with a Turn. A success means affecting all targets with the effect. A ’T’ means an automatic success and a ‘D’ means a maximum effect.

As I stated before, this is quite powerful, much more so than being able to Turn undead. Thus, a monk would have to give up some other mechanic(s) to balance out the class. There are two that are obviously available: combat ability and spell-casting.

Thus, we have four options:

1. Monks fight as Magic-users (no armor, limited weapons)
2. Monks cast as fighters (no spell casting)
3. Monks fight as thieves (leather armor and limited weapons) AND cast as fighters
4. Monks fight as Magic-users AND cast as fighters

I think Option 4 would make this class largely unplayable. Basically, the class would be a heal-bot that could offer nothing much else during an adventure, especially during combat. Option 1 would blur the line between magic-user and cleric in an interesting way, but I think it would be too powerful. This leaves us with deciding on the fighting ability of the monk: fight like a cleric or like a thief.

I am sore tempted to go with Option 2 for playability reasons. With no spells, the monk becomes a glorified medic. Limiting their ability to jump into combat in a meaningful way would make me think twice about playing it, whereas being a legitimate second-line fighter that allows clerics to freely use utility spells without worrying about healing sounds like a lot of fun.

Thoughts?

The Holmesian Druid Revisited

My last post on a Holmesian Druid got some very interesting responses that I have been meaning to respond to, but I have been laid up in bed for the last several days feeling rather awful and was in no shape to either write or even think straight enough to give a decent response.

Since I want to address several points from those comments and since I have ignored my blog for the last several days, I thought that the discussion deserved its own post.

Firstly, whenever I post stuff with the Holmes+Cook tag I am continuing a long standing thought experiment about what my version of D&D would have looked like if the only sources I had were Holmes and Cook where Holmes had precedence over Cook (in a reversal of what it says in Cook). Therefore, when I try and figure out how to do a subclass in this context, I am largely confining myself to these two rulesets as written and my own proclivities.

Secondly, I am an old-school Champions player. I actually played editions 1-3, still own editions 2 & 3 and, in general, it is the RPG system I have played more than any other outside of all the various versions of D&D. One of the basic (and brilliant) assumptions of Champions is that the powers of superheroes are too numerous to try and make an RPG work. Therefore, all powers are described strictly as mechanics. This leaves players the freedom to skin those mechanics however they want. An 8d6 energy blast can be a ray gun, a sonic blast, dragon breath or whatever you fancy. Therefore, when I look at RPGs, I tend to disassociate mechanics from their descriptors.

Thirdly, I am a Christian. In Holmes, there are several implicit Christian ideas. This encourages me to do what I already love to do: look at RPGs through the lens of Christianity and to use both Scripture and the history of the Church to find ideas that can be applied to RPGs.

When I look at the mechanics of the four classes in D&D here is what I find:

• Fighters are good at combat. Therefore, subclasses ought to specialize in certain aspects of combat at the cost of other aspects of combat.
• Magic-users are good at spell-casting. Therefore, subclasses ought to specialize in certain types of magics at the cost of being good at other types of magic.
• Thieves are good at mundane aspects of the game. They get extra chances at surprise and opening doors, for example. Therefore, subclasses ought to specialize in certain aspects of the mundane at the cost of others.
• Clerics are mechanically the most complex of the classes because they are okay at combat and okay at spell casting. The one mechanic that differentiates them from any other class is Turning. Therefore, subclasses ought be able to use the Turning mechanic for different special effects at the cost of affecting the undead.

Thus, the idea that a cleric channels the divine, life-giving force of God to repel and dispel the undead is a special effect — a way to skin the mechanic of Turning. The mechanic itself merely suggests that the cleric can affect 2d6 creatures of a certain type.

Thus, when I look at the druid, I do not see a paleolithic pagan that had some import in the pre-Roman Celtic world. I see someone like Daniel, several of the martyrs or the likes of St. Francis of Assisi who could look in face of fierce animals and either make friendly, have them go on their way or even become life-long companions. The mechanic of Turning is a great way to express this, because not all Christians who went into the arena avoided death by lion, etc.

St. Ignatius the God-bearer
depicted getting mauled by lions in his icon

As Scott Anderson suggested, the special effect could involve being able to have a conversation with the animals where the level of success could indicate how involved or detailed that conversation could get up to where ‘D’ indicates that the animal could function as a henchman.

In other words, the mechanic of Turning allows for cleric subclasses to express a plethora of special effects that emulate various miracles of the saints. We just have to decide which miracles are appropriate and which types of targets are applicable.

I will add that, like many of the commenters on my last post, I don’t have a lot of love for the druid class as presented in D&D in all of its forms. I have played a druid exactly once and I just remember being frustrated at every turn. Thus, one of the things that I keep in mind when I create or re-skin a character class is whether or not I would want to play one. A druid that uses the Turning mechanic to interact with animals is a druid I would play.

Holmes & Cook: Druid

Since I am in the frame of mind to do so, I have been meditating upon how to fulfill the promise of this paragraph from Holmes:

There are a number of other character types which are detailed in ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS. There are sub-classes of the four basic classes. They are: paladins and rangers (fighting men), illusionists and witches (magic-users), monks and druids (clerics), and assassins (thieves).

The most challenging of these (given my own prejudices and predilections) is the druid. Traditionally, the druid forgoes the cleric Turning ability and heavier armor in order to excel at nature-based skills and magic. Given that my only source material for creating a druid class for my version of Holmes & Cook is, well, Holmes and Cook, that approach really doesn’t lead me anywhere. There are no real mechanics about nature skills nor are there that many spells that could be described as nature magic.

This leaves me with an extant mechanic that normally is never associated with druids: Turning.

While this may seem odd, given the context of Holmes, where the druid is clearly labelled as a type of cleric and Turning is clearly a cleric-based mechanic, it actually make more sense in my head to go down this path rather than the one historically taken by D&D.

Therefore, the question becomes what exactly will the Turning ability represent in the case of a druid?

Given the whole nature schtick that is normally associated with the class, it occurred to me that the Turning ability of a druid could be associated with animals in the same way that it is associated with the undead with clerics.

Thus, a druid could use the Turning table to represent their ability to scare off or make friends with animals of various HD. A result of ‘D’ could then indicate the ability to take on an animal as a henchmen, rather than just being friendly.

Otherwise they function exactly like clerics.

Holmes & Cook: Illusionist (Saintly Saturday)

Today is the feast of the Martyrs Eutropius and Cleonicus who were betrayed to the Governor Asclepiodotus of Amasia (northern Turkey) during the reign of Diocletian (A.D. 284-305). They were tortured and crucified. Both of them were kinsmen of the Great Martyr Theodore the Recruit who had been martyred under the previous governor.

This last fascinating piece of information has me meditating on such things as legacies, mantels and traditions of what has come before. In context of RPGs, my first was Holmes Basic D&D. Recently, this reality has hit home because I’ve been watching Matt Finch run Swords & Wizardry Complete on YouTube. 

          

One interesting quirk about the Complete edition of S&W is that it offers up several different ways to do initiative, one of which emulates Holmes. Fascinatingly, it is this version that Matt uses when running his games. I’ve always wanted to try it out, and I’ve got to admit that it is a lot more elegant that I ever imaged.

This got me reminiscing about my own meditations on Holmes and the thought experiment I had about using it in conjunction with Cook’s Expert D&D. Specifically, this quote:

There are a number of other character types which are detailed in ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS. There are sub-classes of the four basic classes. They are: paladins and rangers (fighting men), illusionists and witches (magic-users), monks and druids (clerics), and assassins (thieves).

I’ve postulated an Assassin class (which still needs work), a Paladin class, a Ranger class and a Witch class (reskinned as an Alchemist). Since my last post reskinned magic in terms of language I decided to see what would happen if I used some of the principles I postulated there to come up with a spell list for a Holmesian Illusionist class.

The principles I used look like this:

• All the spells come from either Holmes or Cook no new spells
• I took all the spells (from both the magic-user and cleric lists) that could be understood as illusion magic and moved them one spell level down. For example, Mirror Image (a 2nd level magic-user spell) becomes a 1st level Illusionist spell.
• I then filled out the rest of the spell list with mostly utility spells, moving most to be one spell level higher. For example, Floating Disc (a 1st level magic-user spell) becomes a 2nd level Illusionist spell.
• I went half-way in-between clerics (8 spells per spell level) and magic-users (12 spells per spell level) to give the illusionist spell list 10 spells per spell level.

Finally, there weren’t enough spells to justify a 6th level spell list, so I limited the Illusionist to 5 spell levels:

1st Level

1. Audible Glamer
2. Charm Person
3. Dancing Lights
4. Detect Illusion
5. Invisibility
6. Light
7. Magic Mouth
8. Mirror Image
9. Phantasmal Force
10. Read Magic

2nd Level

1. Cause Fear
2. Dispel Illusion
3. Floating Disc
4. Hold Portal
5. Invisible 10’r.
6. Shield
7. Silence 15’r.
8. Sleep
9. Snake Charm
10. Suggestion

3rd Level

1. Charm Monster
2. Confusion
3. Continual Light
4. Detect Illusion
5. ESP
6. Hallucinatory Terrain
7. Invisibility 10’r.
8. Levitate
9. Massmorph
10. Wizard Lock

4th Level

1. Clairvoyance
2. Dispel Magic
3. Feeblemind
4. Fly
5. Haste
6. Hold Person
7. Infravision
8. Magic Jar
9. Protection from Normal Missiles
10. Water Breathing

5th Level

1. Cloudkill
2. Dimension Door
3. Geas
4. Hold Monster
5. Invisible Stalker
6. Projected Image
7. Remove Curse
8. Telekinesis
9. Teleport
10. Wizard Eye

Spell progression would look like this:

Level…Spells Slots per Spell Level
1st…1
2nd…2
3rd…2…1
4th…2…2
5th…2…2…1
6th…3…2…2
7th…3…2…2…1
8th…3…3…2…2
9th…3…3…3…2…1
10th…4…3…3…2…2
11th…4…3…3…3…2
12th…4…4…3…3…3
13th…5…4…4…3…3
14th…5…4…4…4…3

Otherwise, they function as magic-users.