100 Complications for the ISLE OF THE UNKNOWN

[ritt]

I've done the first fourteen.

Roll 1d100 as many times as you desire. Accept, reject, or play around with the results. Please note that many entries on the table contradict each other: This is quite deliberate.

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1: The city in Hex 2409 is ruled by a tyrant who only tolerates adventurers as long as they pay crushing “Tributes” (25% of all loot) and agree to be his “Knights” (i.e. do dirty work on command).

2: The Clerics on the Isle are heretics exiled from this culture's mainland, followers of an older, “Purer” religion rather than the the now-corrupt, greedy, and bureaucratized main church.

3: The Clerics on the Isle are heretics exiled from this culture's mainland, followers of an older, “Purer” religion that still performs cruel and brutal practices that were abandoned long ago and that are no longer tolerated in the modern, civilized world.

4: The Isle used to be fully inhabited and civilized, until the monsters breeding in dark places swarmed out and overran it. Ruins are everywhere. The current human population are colonists, convicts, and crusaders re-claiming it.

5: The town in Hex 2103 is ruled by an alien warrior-king named Shepard Elias Pooley. A soldier from a land called “Ahmerekah”, he was zapped to the Isle by a bolt of green lightning that struck him while he was taking point on patrol in Vietnam in 1971. Pooley has an M-60 machine gun with 1d6x 100 rounds remaining and 1d6 grenades. He is the only black man in the world.

6: The city in Hex 2409 is a colony of Pseudo-Japan, Pseudo-China, Pseudo-Arabia, Tekumel, Melnibone,Vornheim, etc. It's highly civilized and has a lot to offer traders and explorers, but it's complex culture is very alien to the rest of the setting. They will regard the PCs as barbarian trash until given reason to believe otherwise.

7: Each of the NPC clerics on the Isle is the prophet of a new, unique religion. Their personalities, temperaments, and organizations have more in common with L. Ron Hubbard, David Koresh, or Jim Jones than typical mace-wielding fantasy clerics. They all hate each other.

8: The city in Hex 2409 is a “Lost world”- the last holdout of a long-gone ancient civilization (If your campaign baseline is Medieval Europe, for example, it could be a remaining pocket of Classical Greece or Rome, or even a petty kingdom founded by refugee Arthurian knights. If your campaign baseline is Renaissance or Victorian, it could be a Prester John-ish feudal kingdom. Or Atlanteans with silver togas, ape-man slaves, and laser-lances. Go nuts.)

9: The town in Hex 0516 was founded by the crew of a ship who were all cursed to never sail again after raping a native shaman's children on some distant tropical isle. Sea monsters attack them incessantly every time they get more than a few hundred yards out to sea. Generations later, the city is still ran along nautical lines, with a “Captain” instead of a king or baron, “Crew” instead of “Subjects”, naval discipline for crimes, history with “Mutinies” instead of revolutions, etc.

10: The Isle's Southern beaches are littered with the wrecks of ships from every culture and time imaginable (Little or nothing is salvageable). It's clear that people from a lot of different places have been washing up on these shores for a very long time.

11: Creatures extinct in our real world are common on the Isle: Not dinosaurs or sabertooth tigers or anything “Pulpy”, but odd and mostly harmless things like dodos, Tasmanian tigers, passenger pigeons, quagga, and aurochs.

12: There are naked, stone-age “Savages” on the Isle once you get far enough inland. Most are shy and peaceful, but 1/6 are cannibals and headhunters. 2/6 are pygmies. All of them are Caucasian.

13: One or all of the settlements on the Isle are actually penal colonies that recently got cut off from the mainland by an apocalyptic war or a massive natural or magical disaster (Pseudo-England sunk, or got hit by an asteroid, Cthulthu woke up, the Rapture came to pass, etc.). The guards have all been killed and the former inmates are now in charge. All of the PCs are killers, bandits, pimps, thieves, rebels, and/or rapists. All of the clerics are heretics.

14: The Isle is the only place in the world where magic works and monsters are real. The world outside of the Isle is a very typical leeches-and-bad-teeth, "Know your place, commoner!" kind of place, so evey would-be-hero, fringe sage, demon-worshipper, kook, weirdo, loser, failed merchant, escaped criminal, and lunatic comes here, for better or worse. The powers-that-be tolerate this because it's a social safety valve for troublemakers, and because sometimes big sacks full of gold come back. Many priests in the main religion think that the Isle may in fact actually be Hell.

15:

[geoffrey]

Those are some awesome complications. Here's another one:

15: Town 0712 is Pembrooktonshire, in all its glorious weirdness. (Cf. No Dignity in Death: The Three Brides and People of Pembrooktonshire, both by James Raggi.) The culture and technology (minus gunpowder) of Pembrooktonshire is similar to that of western Europe circa A. D. 1700. Just about every person in town seems to have a different sort of defective personality. The town is insular and looks down on all non-Pembrooktonshiretonians. It's like a giant high school clique.

[ritt]

16: The tyrant that lords over the city in hex 2409 depends on bread and circuses to keep his subjects happy and distracted. His arena will pay top dollar (100 SP or more per HD) for captured monsters.

17: After particularly bad storms, locals often find...things washed up on the beach of Hex 2103: A dead mermaid. A bloated dead elephant whose belly turns out to be stuffed with rare jade. Half-rotted sea monsters of Lovecraftian scale. Barrels of weird, exquisite liquors. A human corpse in a 1970's Soviet cosmonaut's spacesuit. A beautiful dead dolphin with silver bones. A dead kraken wearing golden crowns on each of it's tentacles like finger-rings. The main local business consists of finding, recording, and selling these finds, and the locals do very well by the standards of the Isle.

18: All of the Isle's “Monsters” share a single mother: An immortal, shape-changing, whale-sized thing that normally lives six miles underwater in an abyssal trench a few hundred miles off the coast. One night every six years she walks out of the surf in the form of a nude, beautiful, but somehow deformed or disfigured girl and mates with a lighthouse keeper or lonely fisherman. A year later she beaches her massive true form on the shores of Hex 1615 to give birth. Anyone that sees her true form must save vs. magic or put out their own eyes. There is an underground cult that worships her as God.

19: If you destroy one of the Isle's magical statues, you turn to stone or metal and take it's place.

20: There is a dying noble in the city who wants to find, examine, and sketch all the Isle's magic statues. He will pay a flat 1000 SP per statue encountered to explorers and bodyguards willing to aid him in this this.

21: Cults have sprung up worshiping the Isle's monsters as gods. If fact, outside the clerics and the city (Hex 2409) this is the Isle's main religion, and many otherwise sane, decent, and educated people have no moral problem with sacrificing children or outsiders to these creatures every now and then ("That girl's family is dirt poor, what future would she have ever had anyway?" "If we don't keep the Low Gods happy, they'll come right in the village and just take human flesh! Do you want that? Huh?" "This is our culture, who are you sword-trash to judge it?"). Some of the monsters eat the victims left out to them, but most don't even notice or care.

22: The ruler of the city in Hex 2409 fancies himself the "King" of the entire island. No one outside the city's walls agrees. Strife between the city and the Isle's other settlements is common, and it's very easy for fighters to find work.

23: Because of it's remoteness, the Isle is a common destination for wanted fugitives. In fact, almost every human here has a dark secret.

24: Each human settlement on the Isle has a dramatically different culture (Pyramids, mummys, and sun-god worship in one village, top-hats and hoop-skirts in the next). They even all have different languages (The 1d6 best-educated/most worldly people in each settlement speak "Common"). Are they colonies of abductees snatched by forces unknown from different worlds and times, or is this just the long-term effect of isolation and travel on the monster-haunted Isle being so dangerous?

25: The Isle is the playground/sandbox of a pantheon of seven young, spoiled, bored gods. They made all the funky monsters, statues, and exotic effects.

26: There is a floating cloud city that hovers 6000 feet above the Isle. It starts the campaign in Hex 2616 and has a 1/6 chance each day of moving one hex in a random direction (But it never leaves the map, as it has some unknown connection to the Isle). How will our heroes get to it... and what will they find when they get there?

27: There is a horde of 1d100+50 George Romero-style zombies milling around the creepy statue in Hex 2311. They have a 1/6 chance each day of wandering off one hex in a random direction (But they won't go off into the ocean). The city's (Hex 2409) walls can keep them out, but if they enter a hex containing a village they will, barring PC intervention, destroy the settlement over 1d6+1 days, adding (Current number of zombies x1d6) zombies to their ranks in the process.

28: The lines between the plant and animal kingdoms are blured on the Isle: Elves have sap for blood and corn-silk for hair, trees have blood for sap, deer have wooden antlers, some trees travel in herds and cry out if cut, etc. Spells that effect plants have a 2/6 chance of working on animals and vice-versa.

[skars]

I thought I would throw a couple in the hopper with a nethack flare

29: Ancient tomes of wisdom are often guarded by the Island's statues. (when destroying a statue, there is a 1/6 chance of a random spellbook being contained within)

30: The Watcher continuously gazes upon the Sun in the Prairie of Fire amongst the Sunflowers (Hex 1414). It is said that unwary travelers are often found frozen in time with the Watcher while picking the flowers. (Floating Eye HD 2, 11hp, Move 30' Special: When attacked 2/3 chance of Passive Gaze [Failed WIS Save causes temporary paralysis d70 turns])

[Ynas Midgard]

Great thread Here are mine, hope you like them:

31: When a Magic-User of the Isle dies, the supernatural powers of his are transferred to the last person he touched. Some say if that man was the Magic-User's murderer, he also receives a terrible curse of some sort.

32: There is a horrific parallel-dimension which appears to be a twisted evil version of the Isle, with all its original inhabitants having a sinister clone there, plotting against the "real" Isle. Fortunately, transition between the two worlds is not easy: one has to kill all NPC Magic-Users, bring their rotting bodies together in a town, and burn them at the same time when the clock in the tower rings thirteen times in a row.

33: In most settlements redheaded children are believed to be the Devil's minions and are outcast from society. Contrary to expectations, most of them survive and form savage tribes who pillage travellers and merchants of the civilised world. Survivors claim they have supernatural powers, which usually manifest as control over animals and plants, twisting them into mockeries of man to kill and wreak havoc.

34: The Isle and everything that happens on it is merely a dream of some young girl who tried to run away from her elders' farm. This world is solely created so that she can "learn the lesson", and when she awakes the world is destroyed. Needless to say, secret societies would give everything to find and secure the girl so that she can never wake up.

35: The Isle is actually the far far future of Carcosa; men have finally united and claimed the world their own. Some suspect there might exist other possible futures of Carcosa in different dimensions, where mankind was not that lucky. After two expeditions lost to the void, the scientists of the Isle have given up on studying such alternate dimensions.

[ritt]

36: The first step to becoming a magic-user on The Isle is to accept the hard truth that you are nothing more than an imaginary character in a game played by unknowable alien gods. Wizards tend to be fatalistic and traditionally often use game-related symbols such as dice, cards, board game pawns, chess pieces, checkerboard pattens, etc. All magic-users get one LotFP skill point per level, but they can only spend these points towards mastering games (Chess, poker, backgammon, go, bridge, etc.).

37: The Isle is the one place in the world where an otherwise despised and oppressed minority group (Gays, pseudo-Gypsies, pseudo-Jews, pseudo-Circa 1850's Mormons, mutants, halflings...whatever) can live relatively free of discrimination and pogroms. Roughly 2 out of 6 of all humanoids encountered on the Isle will belong to this group, possibly more in settlements. Lots of the jargon and fashion on The Isle comes from this group's culture.

BTW Ynas, the idea of The Isle being Carcosa's far future is awesome.

[ritt]

38: There is a horde of native barbarian tribesmen in hex 1201 with 1d10 x 100 able-bodied male warriors on horseback. Like the Celts they fight naked and wear woad paint, like the Vikings they have a berserker culture that uses psychedelic mushrooms, and like the natives from an old B-movie they shrink heads, use blowguns, and milk deadly poisons out of brightly-colored frogs (They paint their naked bodies to look like these tiny amphibians). They have a 2/6 chance each day of roaming one hex in a random direction (But they won't go off into the ocean). The city's (Hex 2409) walls can _probably_ keep them out, but if they enter a hex containing a village they will, barring PC intervention, sack the settlement in one bloody night. They have a brutal warrior raiding culture and are illiterate but they are human beings and can be reasoned with, negotiated with, hired, bought off etc.

39: In Hex 0205 there is a rotting ship wrapped in cobwebs, with sails made out of shrouds. It has a crew of @45 Ray Harryhausen/ARMY OF DARKNESS-style animated skeletons: Rapists, pirates, slavers, oath-breakers, pederasts and mutineers so evil that they were cursed by The Gods Themselves to aimlessly float the seas and and fight until their very bones were ground into dust. They have a 1/6 chance each day of floating one hex in a random direction (Part of the curse is that the ship can't be steered and basically just floats along at random). If they hit ground, the Skull Sailors will pour out and rampage, traveling one hex per day towards the nearest settlement. The city's (Hex 2409) walls can keep them out, but if they enter a hex containing a village they will, barring PC intervention, destroy the settlement in one ghastly night.

40: Every mountain on the island was, by some awesome magic or unknowable technology, carved into a massive effigy of the face of some now-forgotten ancient tyrant or god in prehistory. His face is also on all the really ancient coins retrieved from dungeons. Who was this being? Flakes and savages worship him as a god and await the day he'll return to reclaim "His" island.

41: The tyrant of the city in Hex 2409 has a magic sword. An honest-to-Crom MAGIC F***ING SWORD. This should be a big deal in itself, but if magic swords are no big deal in your game he has a legendary named one that _Everyone_ grew up hearing stories about (On the level of Excalibur or Stormbringer). This priceless and unique treasure is feared by the timid and coveted by the ambitious. It's a Sword +2 that ignores all armor, but the wielder must castrate himself with the blade before he can wound another being with it. No (known) woman has ever wielded it. The elves and dwarfs believe it to be the first sword forged by the first smith in the morning of the world and resent a mere human having it. In keeping with LotFP's themes of horror and tragedy, if more people are killed fighting over the sword than are actually killed by the sword then you are doing it right.

42: There are seven dragons in the world: One for each of the Seven Deadly Sins. They say the Dragon of Greed lairs under the mountain in Hex 1207, counting his tens of thousands of coins over and over again. Is this nothing but a myth? A symbolic parable? Is the "Dragon" just a dinosaur nesting in an old gold mine? A clever trap involving napalm and acoustics guarding a vein of dolm jade? An undead "Human Centipede" made from the bodies of 101 thieves guarding a now-forgotten troop payroll? Whatever it is, it's not a typical Monster Manual dragon.

[ritt]

43: There are seven dragons in the world: One for each of the Seven Deadly Sins. They say the Dragon of Lust lairs under the mountain in Hex 1207, coming out once each year in the Spring to rape a human woman. This is supposedly where all the Isle's bizarre monsters come from.

[Red Baron]

Oct 28, 2013 20:16:20 GMT -6 ritt said:

psychedelic mushrooms

Actually thats an urban legend. Although they have some similar effects, the vikings would not have had access to such things at the time. It was primarily a massive triggered adrenaline release.

Not to say that they shouldn't use them. Psycadelic mushrooms are very IotU.

[ritt]

44: Where do all the Isle's weird monsters come from? They're being deliberately imported from... elsewhere by powerful beings that use the entire island as a safari park. Wicked Poul Anderson-esque elves? Decadent nobles? Bored vampires? The space aliens from Carcosa in power armor with zero-point energy rifles?

45: Carcosa is Hell. If your character dies on the Island, he wakes up (Without memory, and with a funny new skin color, but with the same stats and XP) naked on the shores of Lake Hali.

[ritt]

46: The "Statues" are actually magically petrified ancient heroes, turned to stone and erased from history (Each is level 11+1d6). Certain magics could free them, but perhaps whoever trapped them in this state had a very good reason?

47: The Isle isn't moored to the world's crust and actually floats, like an iceberg. Perhaps it even drifts from world to world. Collisions with other large islands or continents happen every decade or so and make life on the coasts precarious. There are rumors of a "Captain's Chair" on the lowest level of the Dungeon of the Unknown that allows one to steer the Isle.

48: Magic works on the surface, technology works underground. Things are like traditional D&D aboveground, but the "Dungeons" are all THX-1138/Logan's Run/Jack Kirby cities full of albinos in 70's jumpsuits with laser pistols, robots, talking apes, and morlocks. There is a middle layer a few dungeon levels thick where fireballs and ion swords both work. Dwarves are actually products of the underworld, genetically-engineered slaves like Marvel's Deviants or Alpha Primitives.

[ritt]

49: There is a a triple-size, triple normal HD iron golem standing on the cliff in hex 2414, looking out to sea. If a virgin climbs to the top of the golem and commits suicide by jumping off his or her soul will enter the golem and can control it. This control only lasts (WIS of virgin) days, as an engine inside the golem powers it by slowly burning up the soul of the "Pilot" for fuel, utterly destroying it. Heroes being rare, this is traditionally how the folk of the Isle have dealt with giant rampaging monsters. Everybody nearby knows about the "Statue" that legends say sometimes comes to life, but the whole golem/virgin thing is a tightly-held secret of the Isle's wizards.

50: The settlement in hex 0903 is actually a leper colony. You would have to live in close proximity to the lepers and fail three saves against death (One a week) to actually catch the disease, and the chances of catching leprosy from equipping or provisioning there are infintesimal, but it still might be unnerving.

[leg1on]

51: Time awry.
Roll a d7:
1 = a day here is a second elsewhere;
2 = a day here is a minute elsewhere;
3 = a day here is an hour elsewhere;
4 = a day is a day;
5 = a day here is a week elsewhere;
6 = a day here is a month elsewhere;
7 = a day here is a year elsewehere.