Tabletop Desktop

Desktop becomes Tabletop

I am stunned by the amount of writing I have been doing with the Oculus (though I do combine the orignal oculus with oculus12 which has a more FU resolution) in my hand. It is not a game, it is not a system, not even a tool. For me the oculus is a different, liberating way of looking at one’s own mind. While I have been hung up in the mechanics (more obsessing over them than anything else) or dismissing any writing as not good enough, the oculus has said just look, just observe and note what you are watching, adding ‘why is it important’? So my thanks to Geoff Osterberg for this creation.

It’s freed me and I appear to be burning the keys with it. Though I must say I do feel slightly guilty that it is not going into a proper journal, but rather into a computer. But then again, it is the bane of not only myself, but the modern man.

 Here is an example, a small one of what the Oculus can do...

Oculus Viewing #3

Experiment with the device continues as I journal the limits of its parameters. Today I focus once again on Murkstav, an adventurer in some alternate earth. I believe he hails from a place called Rivermoon though the locals seem to refer to it as Rilun.

Though let me intercede with a few words about the Oculus itself. It haunts you. I am not sure if it is the way the narrative is made but the Oculus is easy to obsess, almost like picking a good yarn on Netflix. Throughout my travels I have been continuously of returning to the Oculus, of opening the lens once again. No matter the scenario. I am not so much reminded of the Oculus as much as I see more and more opportunities to use it out in the wild. 

20,13 Escape, Nature

The oculus has been thrown. I believe that it is continuing the story of Murkstav, he has escaped the nature, escaped the forest which threatened him. Some fighting is being revealed to me, with swamp-like things (pun intended). He was not winning, with dripping mucous coming from the trees, a nauseous white light surrounding the scene. The kind of white that happened during a hangover in the eighties. There is a will out there, something that I cannot see in the lens but is out there in the forest, a strange feeling indeed that Murk is no doubt feeling. It is waiting out there, haunting him. and for this reason he goes to escape, wildly flying out in the realms.

Motherlode, Gibbous

This lead him to a cave, an open one that while seemingly a cave appears to be an entrance with stairs and old torches around. The Oculus has heralded a Gibbous Motherlode, running into a cave our hero walks in, perhaps too desperately and falls into a cavern, and there is the motherlode, a vast chamber of treasure, with a light far off in front. Surely in this mess, of piles and piles of treasure there is somethign that catches the eye.

Summonarium

Ye gods, our hero, intrepid has fallen right into the middle of a summonarium, the treasures abound an offering for the thing coming through the vortex of blue and black. Cursing in his breath, Murkstav pulls his sword and clerics around him go to seize him, he is perturbed if not annoyed and is... 

we got ourselves a yes but.

Murkstav fights off the clerics, three in all and is wounded, let us see if dungeonwords can resolve conflict. What happens when the clerics are slain, to the summonarium, the portal?

Chained

The thing is chained to the entrance, fighting with its head but it seems a collar and it fights to get out, Murkstav circles, a thought in his head, he does not want to touch the treasure for fear of releasing the demon. He moves about toward the light that appears to the left. Though remember, Murkstav is bleeding. Let us pull the oculus out and ask it but one thing, how bad is the wound?

Solve

Oh yes this is something Murkstav will just have to figure out.

Rogue of Changes V: Solo App Tryout

For the next installment of Rogue of Changes, I decided to both play and review a curious google doc add- on called Solo Roleplay Tools by James Regan which turns the Mythic Solo Engine into a sidebar with various choices representing everything from probability questions to scene setup and the best one (since I use Fudge stats for opposed rolls) Opposed Question which allows you to plug in the appropriate scale for combat. 

I tried it out with good ol' Murk and it was pretty seamless. The only real thing I miss is the Yes, and or No, but that rpgsolo.com rolls up. Also in the Random Generators tab I would fill it up with everything from dungeon layout to random wandering monster or something of the sort. 

Other than that, it really pushes solo-ing toward writing, which is one of my goals in this blog. I plan on using this when I write, when I want to produce a story. So James Regan, great job. 

Now on to part V of our dungeon crawl:

Rogue of Changes V:
Murkstav is at the entrance to the tomb, a great maw of a cave stands to the north. He is poisoned, he cannot go back, he must go forward.

Into the Dungeon : (7) Scene Unaltered*

Nothing has changed for our hero, he is well rested but is still rather poisoned. He must find a cure.

He moves into the entrance, it looks like the entrance to a cave, giant thirty feet by twenty at the apex. The entrance is dark and Murkstav’s hand begins to tremble causing him to switch his sword to the other hand.

“Does he encounter anything as he moves in?” (Unlikely vs 5: 35%) Roll 16: Yes

What does he encounter? Efficiently Glorious .

Murkstav walks into the cave, something shines in the dim dim light. There is a pedestal just ahead of heam, gleaming a dull green. The dungeoneer perceives that it is jade, but found it odd that it was intact. He looks groggily at the floor, looking for skeletons or things that would tell him this whole set-up is a trap.

“Is there anything on the floor? ?” (Somewhat Likely vs 5: 65%) Roll 81: No

Looking to the floor our hero finds nothing of note, this only makes him more suspicious. He looks back to where he came from, the morning star lights looking very inviting right now.

No doubt about it, there is something on this pedestal something that is too glorious, too timely to be believed. It looks to be a potion of healing, a salve in a red bag tied by a brown string. The mercenary has seen it a dozen times in the stores about Rivermoon, but here it is something entirely different, something to be feared.

“Is the potion viable?” (Unlikely vs 5: 35%) Roll 19: Yes

“And is it booby trapped?” (Very Likely vs 5: 85%) Roll 83: Yes

“How likely is it for Murk to perceive the trap?” (Likely vs 5: 75%) Roll 62: Yes

Nothing in the dungeon, in the underground can be too good, there was something, a gleam that Murkstav noticed in that cavern. His skills, his instincts called for hesitation there.

What does the trap consist of? Peacefully Festive

Pardon? Gratify Dreams

Looking like a healing potion, the elixir would induce dreaming, slumber, a sleep potion. As if something wanted to make intruders sleep.

This will make the chaos factor go up in turn

What lurks herein that placed the bait? Cooly Pale

It was then that Murkstav realized that the chamber had become colder. Pulling his cloak closer to his shoulders he ignored the potion on the pedestal and kept moving into the hallway.

Let us see how this works in creating a dungeon, what is the next section? Dangerously Historical

Here I had to go to rpgsolo.com to get the layout of the dungeon, other than that I stayed with the google add-on.

RoC V: From the Mythic trial, using this to make a dungeon...according to the other thing this is dangerously historical, means nothing to me at this time:

Door on right side corridor continues.

5 = 5[d6]

(No encounter)  

At the end of what seemed like a hallway that ran 80 feet ahead are two large historically ornate doors. The one on the right is open and it is likely that there is something on the other side. Yeah its a sure thing that there is something behind that door, grabbing the door.

“Is there something behind that left door?” (Sure Thing vs 5: 90%) Roll 1: Exceptional Yes

There is something cold behind that door, a giant ice golem that feeds on unsuspecting visitors, was that the reason why the other bandits had been hesitating? The door is grabbed by the immense hand and it swings open with a lurch.

This is where the app is the strongest, where the player can input the ranking of each combatant or opposing object: 

“Murk versus ice golem. ?” (My school  vs Ice Golem : 10%) Roll 73: No

“Golem Round 2?” (High vs Superhuman: 10%) Roll 13: No

“3?” (High vs Superhuman: 10%) Roll 42: No

“Last chance?” (High vs Superhuman: 10%) Roll 12: No

“one more for the road?” (High vs Superhuman: 10%) Roll 36: No

There is no way that he is going to go blow to blow with this guy, there has to be another way that he gets out of this situation, He is the hero and there has to bed something. There is an odd luck, no doubt a chaos factor, no doubt somthing else that will change the situation.

So let us up the chaos factor to 9

Considering there is nothing he can do we move onto another question.

“Is there an X Factor that Murk takes advantage of which allows him to defeat/ overcome this enemy?” (Very Likely vs 5: 85%) Roll 33: Yes

Random Event Occurs: NPC action: Disrupt The intellectual

“Away yonder heathen!” the voice boomed from behind the monster, Murk trying desperately to gain a footing, thinking he could best the giant in combat. “Take that for your smite!” it again screamed in a loud deep voice, crashing the monster’s shouders with what seemed like a fireball.

Dungeonance

Looking over these blogs, these posts, my account on steam- it seems we are going through a dungeonance, a renaissance, a rebirth of the good ol’ dungeon crawl. I wonder many times if it is because the dungeon masters and players of the 80’s and 90’s are now having children and they want to relive those thrilling crawls of yesteryear. Even pixels, PIXELS, have been thrown back to their 80’s equivalents. This is astonishing in a world that has such reality games as Skyrim or Metro and Borderlands. 

Why are we going back to those underground memories of old? What lies there? Memory?

My dungeon crawls usually happened on Saturday mornings, starting at 9 am and ending about twelve hours later. Or in the school cafeteria, or the back of Lab class (the dissected frog was our dragon). Even to this day graph paper is a comfort, a dungeon map is a way of organizing my universe- am I am OSR-OCD? 

I am happy for this. Our children are descending into our dungeons, fighting our monsters, reliving our legends into a new age. Our monster manuals are no longer dusty, babies are teething on oversized D20’s and Nethack has a whole new generation of divers and warriors to plunder. 

It is a great thing to hear about these blogs, forums and posts about the next generation growing bright eyed and bushy tailed in the stank, soot and bile of an old-fashioned dungeon crawl. Like fathers like sons I guess, and no character sheet shall ever go dusty. 

Write Up- Rogue of Changes

The floor rushed up, but pain meant life. Murk landed on his feet but a metallic taste hit is palate with equal force. He knew he was poisoned. Sweating, he watched the hall moving off to the north. Illuminated a sharp orange, morning stars hung at ten paces apart, shedding the light on the cobblestone walls. The shadows stretched outward, moving unlike the fire. Murkstav quickly took a hold of his sword, eyeing the two bandits at the end of the hall; where the passage opened to a entrance at the top of wide steps. Once again the taste of metal, seemingly green even, flooded his palate. 

“We always have damned company, Silio” the one on the left in dark robes mentioned turning as Murkstav moved north to confront them. 

“Oh and this one seems quite intent,” the other said, dressed in leather and cape. 

Murkstav did not respond. Never respond to an enemy, he thought simply meeting the sword of the caped one, taking the deep breath away from him, but giving him just enough time to pull out his obsidian dagger. 

But something was wrong, really wrong, the caped one began to infer, wave, evoke and use the prefixes of a conjuring. Blast, a conjurer, by the time one enemy was dead, there came another two. The dungeoneer knew he had to make this fast. That metallic taste drove him, and things were beginning to get fuzzy.

The conjuring continued. Murkstav felt and heard a wind at the corner of his vision. Something was definitely coming. The bandit sliced downward, Murkstav blocked and slashed his wrist with the obsidian. The man reeled, an amateur, and the dungeoneer shoved his sword in a space in the leather armor. His torso slid off the blade as Murk kicked. 

Turning, the whisp slashed at him. Murk slid and pushed his way to the conjuror, knowing well it was the source of the summoning. Not expecting the attack, the summoner fell forward. Murk kicked with his heels and struck upward with the hilt of his sword and cut the man’s thigh. Going down, Murk impaled his dagger in his neck. Exhaling the metal taste, he knew he had to do something about that taste. 

“At least this one’s dead so…” he whispered to himself. 

Yet the whisp still churned in the air, still mixed with the lights and screeched for his blood. 

Who indeed was conjuring who?

(Re) Purpose

Either life or circumstance or just the smell of the subterranean, I got the bug again. Returning here to this rare place to write of things, treasures and monsters under the realms. The main them of this blog is a dungeon crawl as story. But this time it is going to be a bit different. Now it is a story fueled by the thrill, rolling and role-ing of a traditional pen and paper dungeon game. 

People say there is a reason why dungeon crawls do not make it into stories. But nothing in my experience inspired me more than rolling a dice and seeing how the character's life changes from moment to moment. It is a door, a lock, the trigger of a trap, or the growl of something that is not at all human that conjures archetypal ideas. Well, at least in my brain. 

Consider this as a journal of that purpose. Now I have more of a solid methodology to this strange craving of madness. 

NOTE: Nothing gets in the way of the writing, nothing. When confronted with any of these rules, or any of the rules of an RPG and/or oracle I will choose the write, the creative flow of the words destroys any and all rules and numbers. RPG is to be used as an AID not to replace writing.  

Thus next up, methodology, what the hell am I doing?

Scrawl Session 3

Our heroes are in deep trouble, the party is split and things are looking rather unripe. A ramp has separated the two groups: Swann and Jestur and Malfor and Onilio. Alas how does it happen, sounds like a serious serious session with the good ol’ mantrap man. The Gods have not figured on how to get them out of there, thus we switch stories to Otilio and Malfor- the farmer still out from the fight with the Ettin. 

     Malfor coughed, his mind racing after the soul-ring grasped his consciousness from the lost worlds. Upon the brink of death the white-gold carried him forth, returning him to the realm of the living. We wakes but he is very weak, the ring pulling his consciousness from the brink of doom. It floated there and the metal surrounded his spirit until it rushed back to the mortal world of wonder, an greatness to behold. But Malfor returns incredibly weak and tired, barely able t carry his wondrous stuffings.

     Otilio heard the heroes fall down the hall. Heard the familiar slide, it was an old trick devised by a more intelligent culture, but he thought but could not place the magnificent tiles upon the service. The Gnorc entered the tomb from its eastern face, coming across it upon the cliff he scaled with a party. 

     The Gnorc, Otilio rushed down the corridor from where his new-found companions recently screamed from, he found nothing, the handle was on the base, he did notice the curtains waving a bit and the sand-marks of a drag or scuffle. 

     “They must be about here, I am sure of it” he thought to himself. Blazing forth toward the room, the Gnorc knew that this only meant doom to touch the torch but surely there was an alternate trigger. He noted about there was a sconce in the wall behind the torch

     Gnorc grabbed a length of rope, tying it about his waste and flung it over one of the railings supporting the curtains. Hanging himself from the waist he placed a torch upon the sconce. He felt a click, closed his eyes and hoped for the best. 

     Deep below Swann and Jestur fought flinging the remains of a former guest into the leech-flooding hole, they suddenly heard a clang, and the iris of the hole shut, slicing a leech in half.

The Logos Dungeon- Sessions 1 & 2

The Logos Dungeon- Summary of Sessions 1 & 2 using Dyson Logos's map, John Yorio's solo-play technique and Mark's rpgsolo.com amazing gm emulator. 

     A vision, a haunting dream of an open tomb, haunts the dreams of a magically-addicted scholar Igbold. His concubine sells the map that he scrawled in a night-terror stupor to the highest price at an Unnamed Tavern. 

     That highest price was to Jestur, a story-teller of ill-repute, a concoctor of tails and perhaps this very one. An former jester, he convinces the captain of a palace guard, Swann, to go into the business of treasure-hunting. 

     “Even a barbarian can do it!”

     “Barbarians have axes and rage”

     “Well I’ve got this!” Jestur responded, holding a wooden scepter with a jingles hanging from it.

     The two travel toward the location of said map, whereupon they come to a field of desolation, a promised crop gone horribly wrong, a tiny estate confiscated by the king. At the center is Malfor, a shattered farmer with a large bag, with all the tools of his now dead trade. Without much convincing he decides to join the troope. After all, as Jestur explains “Reaping monsters has got to be easier than reaping wheat!”

     After spending the night in camp, the neophyte-adventures venture forward to their destination- an opening in a cliff that glows at night like a beacon. Not many have talked about it, but surely it is the glow of gold. 

     “Too easy,” Swann remarked. 

     “Scared?” Jestur asked. 

     “No just putting you on your guard. It is a lovely shade of filthy rich is it not?”

     At the entrance to our yonder tomb, the trio find the walls lined in spectacular golden plates, each more valuable than the next. However something odd is amiss, the cave is crowded with riches. Pouches purses and packs lay piled high against the walls. 

     Thinking it is an offering, the three put their savings on the piles. 

     “One thing I know my friends is you take the gold when you are leaving!” Jestur gestured. 

     Moving south into the wide high tunnel something was amiss, the men of this accidental company faced a horrible monstrosity that had taken the cave as its refuge- an Ettin. A fierce battle was waged, where the Chivalier swung his sword but was dashed against a wall, dazed; the former-Jester threw bags of gold at the creature; the Farmer impaled and injured the creature but was so wounded he was lost from the battle and perhaps this world. A possible new ally, a tall greenish gnome fought mightily, strangely for his race, with an odd ferocity that none could compare. It was he who cleaved into one of the giant's heads, and continued to best it as our original comrades distracted it.

     Finally the fall of their most inculpable comrade, Malfor, the Farmer, drove the Chivalier to dare a splendid slice upon the creature- who fell barely missing Jestur.

     When the dust settled, the two survivors raced to their friend, seeing him on the brink of death. Gnome approached, Jestur realizing that he was not a gnome but a Gnorc- a gnomish with veins of orcish lineage. Taking a ring from his hand filled with rings, the Gnorc placed it upon the fallen, explaining it as a magical lure to the farmer's spirit. Not a way of catching but a way of catching souls.

     While Otilio, the Gnorc, attended to his patient, Jestur and Swann moved ahead in the tunnel. There they saw a wand burning brightly as a torch floating in the middle of a chamber that opened to the west of the corridor. Silk curtains tied with golden rings neatly invited the visitors. This Jestur found all too inviting, and despite warning from a shouting Otilio, he took the wand which was in reality a clever lever. Swann reacted instantly, as if saving the King himself, he rushed to Jestur and pulled him by the neck to escape the dividing stonewall.

     But it was too late and the two suddenly plummeted as the floor became a slide, carrying them to a dug-out chamber filled with sand. Locking them in place Jestur and Swann were not alone and they soon discovered that perhaps wearing armor in the desert sands is a good idea. For the floor moved and waved as hungry things snaked up and down toward them.

     Grabbing Jestur leg for a supper, the man screamed as Swann hacked at the creature.

     

1.1 No One for The NoName

Unlike the thousands that came before it, scrawled and drawn, argued and menaced about in taverns throughout the southern region of the Prytanian contient; this dungeon simply had no name. Never graced with a title, “The Temple of Disgrace”, “The Tomb of Guidar-Ro”, or “The Ruins of the Beholden Undead”, the sunken rooms under the Brioran Forest existed unmapped and unnamed. 

For that reason it had disturbed adventurers for centuries. For a dungeon with no name, no title, no one knew how to prepare for such an endeavor. Is there undead? Are there traps? Who, or worse, what was buried therein? Did the sight have guards? The fact that no one had come back to Rivermoon or the Oaken District bragging about conquering the no name dungeon did not help its reputation. 

In the Baronny of Rivermoon, constantly under the watchful eye of the Notars, the Milkmoon Tavern enjoyed the reputation of catering to adventurers. While once its walls gleamed a pristine white in those first years of construction, when the city was an infant, now over the centuries those walls were scrawled with thousands of maps, plans, inventories, lists, and protocols for the countless sights that existed underground, at times called the underrealms. But among those glyphs, those plans, those scratched out hpes, not one showed a glimmer of a map or a comment on that sight- called simply, in common N’tari, The NoName.
 
In one clear spot at The Milkmoon, a sphere of emptiness repelled all other drawings on the walls. Clearly spelled by an unknown, was NONAME, the space reserved for one day someone filling in a map of the place. It was the goal of every honest (and otherwise) adventurer to map the NoName. Like the vaults of a mad-king, no one knew if that empty space on the Tavern’s walls helped the promise a kingdom’s ransom, guarded by an impossible foe; or simply the dust and debt-notes of a insane ruler. That unknown kept the space of the NoName intact, without anyone or anything approaching it. Its presence on the walls pushed all other drawings tightly away. Some drunkards, spending far too much time drinking more than extracting treasures, swore the space of the NoName expanded every time. But who could no for sure?
 
The posts that held up the Milkmoon Tavern, there at the highest point of the Baronny of Rivermoon (and thus the ale spilled on its floors eventually ran through the entire city), served as a scheduling or planning posts for parties, adventurers, and campaigns. But nothing mentioned the NoName, and no space was given on the posts, for who would want to plan for something that had no name? 

The space for the NoName became so obvious, so disturbing, that eventually a table and four chairs appeared under it. The patrons knew all to well that whomever sat there chose, even swore, to explore the NoName. Years passed without even a drop of mead touching that table and those chairs. Pristine as the day they were built by Horus Constantu, the master carpenter; they stood, empty and happily alone. 

The silence that enveloped the MilkMoon, growing like an orb of power, came from the lone figure sitting enjoying a tankard at that table. Worse was, it looked like he was waiting for others to join. 

On to Episode 1.2: Evil Emerges First