Further OSR Adventure Path Brainstorming - The Sea of Spices & Napalm Death on Children's Programme

Influences:
Abraham Merritt 
Age Of Fable
Barbary Corsairs
Cargo Cults
Clark Ashton Smith
Dream Park
The Dream Quest Of Unknown Kadath
Headhunting
Jack Vance
Kumari Kandam
Lemuria
Mu
Nidus !!! (funny how things come full circle..Ouroboros!)
The Odyssey
Orientalism !!!
Polynesia
Pre-Spanish Philippines
Sinbad the Sailor
Skull Island
Southeast Asia
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

"The "Sea of Spices" may be considered a misnomer, as in actuality it consists of an uncounted legion of islands and islets, the remains of a submerged mountainous continent, in the cyclone lashed midst of the tropical region of the great ocean, isolated from the other continents of the world; legendary for its wealth in spices, fragrant gums, narcotics, feathers, furs, gems and precious metals."

One though I've come up with in regards to a theorhetical OSR adventure path is that there could be multiple "paths"; you have the pulp fantasy, greed motivated Treasure Hunt; but you could also incorporate a "Save The Heir/Princess" as alternate or additional "path," one that could appeal to altruistic or roleplay motivations ("Dude...I'm going to make that princess fall in love with me!); and a third "evil" path such as "Summon mini-Cthulhu to serve the party as an empire building war beast."

You could use the same setting and materials for three very different experiences...you could run multiple parties through the different "paths" (or on the same path for some competition!) for a dynamic campaign experience.

Anyways, so The Sea of Spices is the location of this thought experiment; as I'm directly referencing many elements of our world's cultures in this, that means I get to use the classic rpg standby of "ham-handed interpretations of real life historical cultures with their serial numbers filed off."

I imagine the Sea of Spices being well-isolated from the continental landmasses; interlopers from these far away regions may be bold explorers, colonial powers, or merely those blown of course/very very lost. From my list of influences the following "faux-cultures" emerge as being non-indigenous people, with all of them being filtered through an inaccurate, Orientalist lens:

Faux-Ancient Greeks - WASP-ish dudes with British accents in fancy bronze armor that act like classical Greek heroes & philosophers.

Faux-Arab/Berbers - Dudes that wear giant turbans and eyeliner; upper class & sorcerer types have British accents.

Faux-Dravidians - Hindu mythological epic style warlords and priests.

Faux-Southeast Asian Types - Dudes with Ankhor Wat style architecture that ride elephants into war

I like this mix...four different cultural groups, four languages, a nice mix of ethnicities to keep things from being too whitebread. Now I need to come up with names for these peoples/cultures. (Iskanders, Sindhus, Kumarikantams & Ankhors?)

Also, this is PRETTY FREAKING AWESOME:

The Dreaded Isle! and Further OSR Adventure Path Thoughts

Firstly: http://www.goblinoidgames.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=284 ; an Awesome-Awesome-Awesome tribute to the X1:Isle of Dread; holy crap, the 4th level chimpanzee thief!

Secondly, the grumpy old man of the OSR, The Chicago Wizard, has some great feedback regarding my musing regarding a theoretical OSR Adventure Path:

"...Paths limit what a player can do. I'm not interested in appealing to mass market. If someone isn't going to "grok" out-of-the-box thinking, then probably old school gaming isn't what's going to appeal to them.

In those "paths", certain things "have to happen" just like in a computer game or our favorite later editions. How does that promote out of the box thinking, original creativity or freedom?"

Those are pertinent points; firstly, I think there is no shame in a railroad as long as that's what all of the participants expect and want (just as long as they are made aware of other options!); secondly, although I care little for mass market appeal, I think such an OSR Adventure Path could be a great way to bring folks that do not care for complex iterations of D&D into the OSR, you grab a copy of Swords & Wizardry or Labyrinth Lord and an Adventure Path and you've got a campaign, ready to use!

However, what I would be interested in would be an Adventure Path without the "Paths"; an Adventure Path where "certain things do not have to happen," an Adventure Path that does promote out of the box thinking, original creativity and freedom.

That's why I think an archipelago treasure hunt could be a great framing device for a non-railroady, creative Adventure Path...one that encourages lateral thinking, originality, unconventional play. An Adventure Path that won't be broken if the players don't follow the script.

Random Thoughts - Does The OSR Need An Adventure Path?

Now we all know that Sandboxes are the one-true-way of the highest expressions of RPG mastery, but... not everyone wants the same thing. There's been discussion about what is needed as an introductory product to draw new players into oldschool D&D-ish games; what kind of experience do most contemporary (non-mmo) computer & console RPGs offer? What kind of expectations would some kid off the street have regarding fantasy adventure?

There's no reason that an Adventure Path has to be a tasteless save-the-world railroad. It can be a series of interconnected sandbox-ish environments with an overarching narrative. A picaresque pulp serial instead of Dragonlance.

Now, just as a thought experiment,  imagine an Adventure Path released by a respectable, quality OSR publisher. An Adventure Path that has a grand caper as the overarching structure, a treasure hunt, perhaps the pieces of a treasure map need to be assembled; a series of MacGuffins that need to be collected before one can get their paws on the super-super MacGuffinf?

I'm imagining an Adventure Path in the vein of Ulysses, Odysseys, and Sinbad. A mysterious sea with a variety of fantastic and bizarre islands. As most published and homebrew campaign settings include oceans, and most also do not describe the entire world, such a setting should be easy to shoehorn into an established campaign world.

Imagine such a path with episodes written by Gabor Lux, Matt Finch, James Raggi, Geoffrey Mckinnley, etc...