Post by geoffrey on Mar 6, 2012 19:41:01 GMT -6
I wrote two introductions for Isle of the Unknown. James Raggi decided to go with the shorter of the two for the published book, a decision with which I agree. That said, some might find the longer introduction interesting. Without futher ado...
A NOT STRICTLY NECESSARY INTRODUCTION FOR THE REFEREE,
or “How do I use this book in my game?”
Referees familiar with wilderness hex-crawling, a method of adventure that goes all the way back to the beginnings of fantasy role-playing games in the 1970s, can ignore this introduction and proceed to the meat of the product. This introduction is meant to help those unfamiliar with the wilderness hex-crawl style of campaigning.
This book describes an island over 25,000 square miles in size. Using Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-Playing (or similar games such as Labyrinth Lord or Swords & Wizardry), the referee can conduct adventures upon the Isle of the Unknown. It can be placed anywhere in the referee’s campaign world, or it can serve as the basis of a new campaign, or as the setting for one-shot adventures.
One point of interest is described for each of the map’s 330 land hexes. None of the monsters, magic spells, magic items, etc. in this book has been taken from any previously published role-playing game product. The player characters will never encounter a monster that they already know how to deal with. (“Oh, a troll. Get the flames and acid ready.”) The old standbys of dwarves. elves, orcs, goblins, etc. are entirely absent. The PCs will never see an NPC on the island cast a spell that they recognize, nor will they find a magic item with which they are already familiar. All this will help ensure freshness and a sense of wonder and newness as your players explore a realm that is truly unknown.
The societies, flora, and fauna of this predominantly mountainous and wooded isle resemble those of the French territory of Auvergne circa A. D. 1311. The island’s highest elevation reaches 8,900 feet, and the most common trees are various types of pines as well as aspens. The human population numbers approximately 70,000. Though only places with a population of at least 1,500 are noted on the map, many hamlets, villages, thorps, etc. dot the island. Ruins (similar to Roman ruins of circa A. D. 200) of a previous civilization are found throughout the island.
This book provides the framework of an adventure setting that each referee will add to according to his desires and the dictates of the campaign. Only the weird, fantastical, and magical is described herein. The mundane is left to the discretion of the campaign referee, to be supplied according to the characteristics of his own conceptions or campaign world. Detailed encounter tables of (for example) French knights, monks, pilgrims, etc. would be of scant use to a referee whose campaign world is a fantasy version of pre-Columbian America.
BEGINNING A CAMPAIGN UPON THE ISLE OF THE UNKNOWN
If the referee wishes to begin a campaign upon the Isle of the Unknown, he is advised to begin the player characters in one of the island’s fifteen towns or in its one city (all marked on the map). Read the hex descriptions containing these settlements, and also peruse the hexes surrounding each village or city. Pick whichever one most interests you.
ARRIVING AT THE ISLE OF THE UNKNOWN
Referees placing the Isle of the Unknown in a pre-established campaign world should note that most ships arrive at the isle at its one city or one of its seven coastal towns (all marked on the map). Read the hex descriptions containing these settlements, and also peruse the hexes surrounding each village or city. Pick whichever one most interests you, and let that be the one for which the PCs have found an intriguing clue.
MOVEMENT
Those on horseback can travel 20 miles a day on the island, 15 miles a day if afoot and unencumbered, or 5 miles a day if encumbered or searching.
THE HEXES ARE HUGE
Someone reading straight through this book can be forgiven if he comes away thinking that the Isle of the Unknown is nearly overwhelmed with weird and magical things. But to the contrary, the isle is quite similar to our mundane Earth. Much more can be found in a hex than the supplied point of interest. The author assumes that most encounters will be with men or with mundane animals, though the sovereign referee might decide otherwise.
It cannot be over-emphasized that each hex in the Isle of the Unknown covers over 86 square miles of territory. Those unfamiliar with actual wilderness might not realize how vast an area 86 square miles is. The author grew-up in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, spending years hiking an area no bigger than 10 square miles, and sometimes finding himself a little bit lost in that relatively small territory despite its familiarity. Thus each 86 square mile hex of wooded mountains (not too different from the author’s childhood home) is a huge, mysterious wilderness with features such as thick forests of countless trees, steep mountains, rocky outcroppings, valleys, streams, pools, lakes, etc.
The chance, therefore, of a party randomly encountering the fantastic point of interest in a given hex would be virtually nil. A person could spend years wandering a single hex and never stumble across a man-sized statue therein, even though he might have wandered within 100’ of it several times. The discerning referee will use or ignore the hex descriptions whenever he sees fit. Whenever the game needs an injection of the fantastic, and regardless of which hex the players wander into, the referee will always have something at hand.
NAMES
To avoid an almost inevitable clash with the nomenclature of the referee’s own campaign or his linguistic tastes, most proper names have been excluded in this book. It is a simple matter for the referee to add whatever sort (French, Polynesian, African, fantastical, etc.) of names he deems appropriate.
That said, the referee might wish to consider leaving geographic features and monsters unnamed. The stream that winds its way through the author’s childhood haunts was ever referred to simply as “the creek” by everyone who lived there. The mountain on which people lived was called “the mountain”. The larger chain of mountains was “the mountains”. Occasionally people referred to these mountains as “the Greenhorn Mountains”, but never were they called by their officially recognized name of “the Wet Mountains”. No forest, clearing, valley, outcropping, or any other geographic feature was ever referred to by name by those who lived there. Instead, one might say, “You know that big outcropping of rocks about a mile up the creek? The ones you can see in the big clearing before the first crossing?”
One can assume that the people who live on the Isle of the Unknown have a similar lack of nomenclature for the areas in which they live. The lake near any given village is simply “the lake”, the woods are simply “the forest”, etc. This would be doubly so for any monster in the vicinity. Such an abomination would be called “the monster”, “the beast”, “the thing”, “the demon”, etc. A large humanoid monster might be “the giant”, while a reptilian monster might be “the dragon”.
MONSTERS
Monsters are not part of the ecosystem. Unless otherwise noted, they do not reside in lairs, require regular food or drink, or reproduce. Monsters do not “fit in” with their surroundings. Their presence is unnatural and jarring. These aberrations do not belong on any natural world. As a rule they are implacably inimical to human life. All of these considerations illustrate why the monsters placed on the Isle of the Unknown are simply placed on the island without any notes on their attitudes or immediate surroundings.
MAGIC-USERS AND CLERICS
None of the NPC spell-casters on the island is given a list of standard spells, and they are assumed to not have any. The unique magical powers of each are given in the text. This makes each NPC spell-caster as well as the player character spell-casters exceptional. The player character spell-casters will be the only spell-casters on the island with “standard” spell abilities. The PCs will be as mysterious to the NPCs as vice versa.
TREASURE
When a hunter in the real world kills a bear, or a lion, or whatever, he never finds a treasure chest in his kill’s lair. Given that the monsters in this book are unique entities with incomprehensibly inhuman thought patterns (assuming any thought patterns at all), treasure is worthless to them. Nor do monsters think that precious metals or stones are “pretty”. If monsters even have a sense of aesthetics (which is doubtful), they would probably think that something such as viscera were beautiful instead. That leaves for a monster only a bit of incidental treasure that previous victims might have been carrying (assuming the monster even stays for any length of time in the vicinity of its victims). But that will be a very small amount. How much money would you carry on your way to a potentially lethal fight?
If the player characters want treasure, they are going to have to acquire it (whether by honest means, or otherwise…) from humans. The setting as presented in the book assumes the relative poverty of France in A. D. 1311. How much treasure do you think that French peasants had stashed away? You can bet they did not have coins under the floorboards in their hovels. They probably did not have any treasure whatsoever.
If the player characters in your campaign want to find treasure chests overflowing with gold, they are going to have to sneak into the palaces and castles of the king, princes, dukes, and such. No places on the island are more heavily guarded. Jewelry? Worn by royalty. Again, heavily guarded. Caravans? Lots of guards once again.
Practically speaking, the treasures the PCs find will be items found on the equipment lists. Have the PCs killed the bandits that ambushed them? The slain bandits’ armor, weapons, provisions, mounts, etc. will be their treasure.
LITERARY INSPIRATIONS
The primary sources of inspiration for this book are the fantastic short stories of Clark Ashton Smith, a friend and contemporary of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard. In particular, Smith’s tales set in Averoigne (a province in a fantasy version of medieval France) characterize the overall feel of the Isle of the Unknown. On the other hand, some of Smith’s stories (particularly those that take place in the prehistoric land of Hyperborea) helped inspire the weird monsters and magic-users resident upon the isle.
Tales of Averoigne
“The End of the Story”
“The Satyr”
“A Rendezvous in Averoigne”
“The Holiness of Azedarac”
“The Maker of Gargoyles”
“The Colossus of Ylourgne”
“The Mandrakes”
“The Beast of Averoigne”
“The Disinterment of Venus”
“Mother of Toads”
“The Enchantress of Sylaire”
Tales of Hyperborea
“The Tale of Satampra Zeiros”
“The Door to Saturn”
“A Testament of Athammaus”
“The Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan”
“Ubbo-Sathla”
“The White Sybil”
“The Ice Demon”
“The Coming of the White Worm”
“The Seven Geases”
“The Theft of the Thirty-Nine Girdles”
THE CARDINAL CONSIDERATION
Everything contained within the covers of this book should be considered by the referee as merely a suggestion from one referee to another. His campaign is his own, and this product is here to serve. In no case should the reader feel bound to anything written within this introduction or in the body of the text. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to use this game aid. If the referee wishes to add standard monsters (such as orcs, trolls, green dragons, etc.), or spell-casters with standard spell lists, or standard magic items, or anything else, let him do so. Nothing prevents him from bestowing upon any or all of the unique monsters described herein heaps of coins and other treasures for his greedy players. In any and all cases, the pontifical referee is encouraged to change things to suit his whims.
A NOT STRICTLY NECESSARY INTRODUCTION FOR THE REFEREE,
or “How do I use this book in my game?”
Referees familiar with wilderness hex-crawling, a method of adventure that goes all the way back to the beginnings of fantasy role-playing games in the 1970s, can ignore this introduction and proceed to the meat of the product. This introduction is meant to help those unfamiliar with the wilderness hex-crawl style of campaigning.
This book describes an island over 25,000 square miles in size. Using Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-Playing (or similar games such as Labyrinth Lord or Swords & Wizardry), the referee can conduct adventures upon the Isle of the Unknown. It can be placed anywhere in the referee’s campaign world, or it can serve as the basis of a new campaign, or as the setting for one-shot adventures.
One point of interest is described for each of the map’s 330 land hexes. None of the monsters, magic spells, magic items, etc. in this book has been taken from any previously published role-playing game product. The player characters will never encounter a monster that they already know how to deal with. (“Oh, a troll. Get the flames and acid ready.”) The old standbys of dwarves. elves, orcs, goblins, etc. are entirely absent. The PCs will never see an NPC on the island cast a spell that they recognize, nor will they find a magic item with which they are already familiar. All this will help ensure freshness and a sense of wonder and newness as your players explore a realm that is truly unknown.
The societies, flora, and fauna of this predominantly mountainous and wooded isle resemble those of the French territory of Auvergne circa A. D. 1311. The island’s highest elevation reaches 8,900 feet, and the most common trees are various types of pines as well as aspens. The human population numbers approximately 70,000. Though only places with a population of at least 1,500 are noted on the map, many hamlets, villages, thorps, etc. dot the island. Ruins (similar to Roman ruins of circa A. D. 200) of a previous civilization are found throughout the island.
This book provides the framework of an adventure setting that each referee will add to according to his desires and the dictates of the campaign. Only the weird, fantastical, and magical is described herein. The mundane is left to the discretion of the campaign referee, to be supplied according to the characteristics of his own conceptions or campaign world. Detailed encounter tables of (for example) French knights, monks, pilgrims, etc. would be of scant use to a referee whose campaign world is a fantasy version of pre-Columbian America.
BEGINNING A CAMPAIGN UPON THE ISLE OF THE UNKNOWN
If the referee wishes to begin a campaign upon the Isle of the Unknown, he is advised to begin the player characters in one of the island’s fifteen towns or in its one city (all marked on the map). Read the hex descriptions containing these settlements, and also peruse the hexes surrounding each village or city. Pick whichever one most interests you.
ARRIVING AT THE ISLE OF THE UNKNOWN
Referees placing the Isle of the Unknown in a pre-established campaign world should note that most ships arrive at the isle at its one city or one of its seven coastal towns (all marked on the map). Read the hex descriptions containing these settlements, and also peruse the hexes surrounding each village or city. Pick whichever one most interests you, and let that be the one for which the PCs have found an intriguing clue.
MOVEMENT
Those on horseback can travel 20 miles a day on the island, 15 miles a day if afoot and unencumbered, or 5 miles a day if encumbered or searching.
THE HEXES ARE HUGE
Someone reading straight through this book can be forgiven if he comes away thinking that the Isle of the Unknown is nearly overwhelmed with weird and magical things. But to the contrary, the isle is quite similar to our mundane Earth. Much more can be found in a hex than the supplied point of interest. The author assumes that most encounters will be with men or with mundane animals, though the sovereign referee might decide otherwise.
It cannot be over-emphasized that each hex in the Isle of the Unknown covers over 86 square miles of territory. Those unfamiliar with actual wilderness might not realize how vast an area 86 square miles is. The author grew-up in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, spending years hiking an area no bigger than 10 square miles, and sometimes finding himself a little bit lost in that relatively small territory despite its familiarity. Thus each 86 square mile hex of wooded mountains (not too different from the author’s childhood home) is a huge, mysterious wilderness with features such as thick forests of countless trees, steep mountains, rocky outcroppings, valleys, streams, pools, lakes, etc.
The chance, therefore, of a party randomly encountering the fantastic point of interest in a given hex would be virtually nil. A person could spend years wandering a single hex and never stumble across a man-sized statue therein, even though he might have wandered within 100’ of it several times. The discerning referee will use or ignore the hex descriptions whenever he sees fit. Whenever the game needs an injection of the fantastic, and regardless of which hex the players wander into, the referee will always have something at hand.
NAMES
To avoid an almost inevitable clash with the nomenclature of the referee’s own campaign or his linguistic tastes, most proper names have been excluded in this book. It is a simple matter for the referee to add whatever sort (French, Polynesian, African, fantastical, etc.) of names he deems appropriate.
That said, the referee might wish to consider leaving geographic features and monsters unnamed. The stream that winds its way through the author’s childhood haunts was ever referred to simply as “the creek” by everyone who lived there. The mountain on which people lived was called “the mountain”. The larger chain of mountains was “the mountains”. Occasionally people referred to these mountains as “the Greenhorn Mountains”, but never were they called by their officially recognized name of “the Wet Mountains”. No forest, clearing, valley, outcropping, or any other geographic feature was ever referred to by name by those who lived there. Instead, one might say, “You know that big outcropping of rocks about a mile up the creek? The ones you can see in the big clearing before the first crossing?”
One can assume that the people who live on the Isle of the Unknown have a similar lack of nomenclature for the areas in which they live. The lake near any given village is simply “the lake”, the woods are simply “the forest”, etc. This would be doubly so for any monster in the vicinity. Such an abomination would be called “the monster”, “the beast”, “the thing”, “the demon”, etc. A large humanoid monster might be “the giant”, while a reptilian monster might be “the dragon”.
MONSTERS
Monsters are not part of the ecosystem. Unless otherwise noted, they do not reside in lairs, require regular food or drink, or reproduce. Monsters do not “fit in” with their surroundings. Their presence is unnatural and jarring. These aberrations do not belong on any natural world. As a rule they are implacably inimical to human life. All of these considerations illustrate why the monsters placed on the Isle of the Unknown are simply placed on the island without any notes on their attitudes or immediate surroundings.
MAGIC-USERS AND CLERICS
None of the NPC spell-casters on the island is given a list of standard spells, and they are assumed to not have any. The unique magical powers of each are given in the text. This makes each NPC spell-caster as well as the player character spell-casters exceptional. The player character spell-casters will be the only spell-casters on the island with “standard” spell abilities. The PCs will be as mysterious to the NPCs as vice versa.
TREASURE
When a hunter in the real world kills a bear, or a lion, or whatever, he never finds a treasure chest in his kill’s lair. Given that the monsters in this book are unique entities with incomprehensibly inhuman thought patterns (assuming any thought patterns at all), treasure is worthless to them. Nor do monsters think that precious metals or stones are “pretty”. If monsters even have a sense of aesthetics (which is doubtful), they would probably think that something such as viscera were beautiful instead. That leaves for a monster only a bit of incidental treasure that previous victims might have been carrying (assuming the monster even stays for any length of time in the vicinity of its victims). But that will be a very small amount. How much money would you carry on your way to a potentially lethal fight?
If the player characters want treasure, they are going to have to acquire it (whether by honest means, or otherwise…) from humans. The setting as presented in the book assumes the relative poverty of France in A. D. 1311. How much treasure do you think that French peasants had stashed away? You can bet they did not have coins under the floorboards in their hovels. They probably did not have any treasure whatsoever.
If the player characters in your campaign want to find treasure chests overflowing with gold, they are going to have to sneak into the palaces and castles of the king, princes, dukes, and such. No places on the island are more heavily guarded. Jewelry? Worn by royalty. Again, heavily guarded. Caravans? Lots of guards once again.
Practically speaking, the treasures the PCs find will be items found on the equipment lists. Have the PCs killed the bandits that ambushed them? The slain bandits’ armor, weapons, provisions, mounts, etc. will be their treasure.
LITERARY INSPIRATIONS
The primary sources of inspiration for this book are the fantastic short stories of Clark Ashton Smith, a friend and contemporary of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard. In particular, Smith’s tales set in Averoigne (a province in a fantasy version of medieval France) characterize the overall feel of the Isle of the Unknown. On the other hand, some of Smith’s stories (particularly those that take place in the prehistoric land of Hyperborea) helped inspire the weird monsters and magic-users resident upon the isle.
Tales of Averoigne
“The End of the Story”
“The Satyr”
“A Rendezvous in Averoigne”
“The Holiness of Azedarac”
“The Maker of Gargoyles”
“The Colossus of Ylourgne”
“The Mandrakes”
“The Beast of Averoigne”
“The Disinterment of Venus”
“Mother of Toads”
“The Enchantress of Sylaire”
Tales of Hyperborea
“The Tale of Satampra Zeiros”
“The Door to Saturn”
“A Testament of Athammaus”
“The Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan”
“Ubbo-Sathla”
“The White Sybil”
“The Ice Demon”
“The Coming of the White Worm”
“The Seven Geases”
“The Theft of the Thirty-Nine Girdles”
THE CARDINAL CONSIDERATION
Everything contained within the covers of this book should be considered by the referee as merely a suggestion from one referee to another. His campaign is his own, and this product is here to serve. In no case should the reader feel bound to anything written within this introduction or in the body of the text. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to use this game aid. If the referee wishes to add standard monsters (such as orcs, trolls, green dragons, etc.), or spell-casters with standard spell lists, or standard magic items, or anything else, let him do so. Nothing prevents him from bestowing upon any or all of the unique monsters described herein heaps of coins and other treasures for his greedy players. In any and all cases, the pontifical referee is encouraged to change things to suit his whims.
