Nguamodon

NGUAMODON
Armor Class: 6 (14)
Movement: 15" (150') without any burden or rider
Hit Dice: 3
Attacks: bite for 1-3 and 2 thumb spikes for 1-3
Cost: 100 gp
Load: Up to 40 lbs/4000 coins at 12" (120') speed, up to 800 lbs/8000 coins at 6" (60') speed

Also known as pack lizards, Nguamodons are a horse-sized species of iguanodon. Herbivores that can survive for two weeks without food or water, they are commonly used as pack animals although any burden limits them to a quadrupedal gait that reduces their speed and renders them unable to use their thumb spikes in combat. They are placid, stupid and easily spooked.

Behold...the Ornith

ORNITH
Armor Class: 8 (12)
Movement: 24" (240')
Hit Dice: 2
Attacks: 1 peck for 1-4
Cost: 25 gp
Load: Up to 300 lbs/3000 coins at full speed, up to 500 lbs/5000 coins at 12" (120') speed

Orniths are a species of quadrupedal avian used as mounts on Planet Algol. They are stupid, easily spooked, and claustrophobic enough to refuse to enter tight quarters such as narrow tunnels; however they are agile and loyal. Their natural diet consists of seeds, nuts, berries and small animals. They can be fed the same feed as Zorses, but in areas with plentiful untainted flora and fauna they are able to supplement their diet naturally and only require half rations. Their heads resemble that of a parakeet or small parrot; their bodies are equine but with bird feet instead of hooves and a feathers for a tail; and their plumage generally resembles that of parrots, parakeets, pigeons and doves. Especially colorful specimens command a higher price.

Emergent Character Backstory...

Although I caution my players from investing too much effort into the back story of a 1st level character who could easily get incinerated by the radioactive eye-beams of a mutant cyborg random encounter, I do enjoy it when a back story emerges. Which coincidentally enough, usually happens sometime after the character achieves 2nd level.

One of the players in my Planet Algol campaign has a character, Nigel Nightbreaker, a British Fighting-man who, due to my ability score requirements for weapons house rules, uses a halberd in melee. He is also upset that he can't find ale or beer anywhere.

However, while talking after a session, we decided that on account of him being a polearm wielding Englishman that he was most likely a Beefeater who had been guarding British archaeological treasures in the Tower of London. One eve while investigating a strange glow emanating from a bizarre artifact he was transported to Planet Algol 210? A.D.

Mounts and Pack Animals of Planet Algol Pt.1

Nguamodon - Horse-sized iguanodons, semi-bipedal, can go two weeks without food or water.

Ornith - Quadrupedal horse-sized "bird horses" with four clawed feet and a parrot-like head.

Pack scarab - Man-sized clumsy, bumbling scarabs. Stupid but fearless, eats offal, carrion, feces and filth.

Swordbeak - Larger, feather-less vicious cousins to the orniths with a long vulture-like neck and a curved sharp sword-like beak.

War lizard - Bipedal dinosaurs, the light varieties are similar to sturdy, scaled deinonchynus while the heavy varieties resemble smaller ceratosaurus. The warhorses of Planet Algol. They must regularly gorge on meat.

Zorse - A true, viable species on Planet Algol, as opposed to the Horse-Zebra hybrids of the same name and apperance of our Earth

I'm Going to Say Something Nice About Recent Editions of D&D

For the precision ballet of violence in computer games like X-COM, Fallout 1 & 2, and skilled Counterstrike play, as well as many action movies, 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons is an excellent rule set.

If you needed an RPG to simulate the long drawn out, up and down, back and forth showy battles of Professional Wrestling 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons would be a perfect fit.

Exploration and the death of the Hexmap

Dungeons & Dragons is a game of exploration. Or it was a game of exploration, before the railways began offering guided tours. It used to be that you would plunge into a howling wilderness, blindly crawling through the hexes in search of your goals. Nowadays you follow the trail of macguffins from setpiece to setpiece.

As an aside, I love it when I'm playing a computer/console RPG and I end up totally outflanking the plotline via an open world and my own curiosity. Kill the bad guy? I already iced the bastard when I found a sinister castle in the woods and slew him an account of his sinister vibes and possible treasure.

That's not going to happen in a "contemporary" adventure. You won't need to load up the pack mules with food, water and blank hex-parchments in order to find the Lost Temple of the Toad-Wizard, you just need to pass a skill challenge.

One of my favorites aspects of old adventure fiction is the "expedition" aspect. The equipment inventory in Journey to the Center of the Earth. The survival plans of a band of castaway shipwreck survivors. The battle with a hostile alien wilderness in The Walls of Eryx. The man versus mountain battle to the summit of Stardock.

It makes the Boy Scout in my blood howl for adventure. It makes me want to load a backpack with rope, rations, canteens, maps and tools and strike out into the forests seeking ruins.

Oldschool wilderness adventuring was a gamble. You hope you find something worthwhile before nature and wandering monsters takes too dear a toll. You seek out rumors, maps and guides if you're smart. But even then it's not a sure thing. You could always get hopelessly lost and stumble into the lair of an ancient red dragon.

And I'm fine with that, a reward is worthless without risk.

I was not happy when "the hobby" started ditching hexmaps. Sure "real maps" are prettier and "more realistic." But I don't need to be fucking around with a ruler and a map to calculate how far the party travels in a day.

Hexmaps are excellent. They abstract distance and terrain into manageable chunks without breaking the illusion. And they facilitate capital-A Adventure. Those hexes beg to be filled with ruins, lairs and general strangeness. They encourage the DM to place awesome eastern egss in random corners of the wilderness. They allow the party the freedom to do what they want instead of helping the DM with a story.

Another computer/console games aside, I can't play video games that aren't "open world." Bioshock is beautiful and fun, but I throw up in my mouth when confronted with the railroad. I'm a free man goddammit, I seek adventure on my own damn terms. And the open world makes me want to explore.

Hexmaps were thrown out by the industry in order to facilitate the "fantasy pornography" of artistic, beautiful maps. Maps that serve as a mere backdrop for the adventure instead of being a crucial part of adventure. Or even the adventure itself.

Hexmaps were thrown away as they were rendered useless by the setpiece railroads. Entitled heroes with a destiny to save the world shouldn't waste their time getting lost in the swamp and contacting malaria. Or die of dehydration in the desert.

Dream Park, Digital Technology and the "Future" of RPGs

Over on Lamentations of the Flame Princess is a great post about feeling alienated by the current climate of digital initiatives, subscriptions, required accessories and so forth in "the cutting edge of the gaming hobby." Granted, squeezing money out of games goes all the way back to the days of official character sheets and so forth, but with the current climate of hyper-marketing and so forth, it's sad seeing the hobby being so .....manipulated.

I've also seen discussions regarding the future of RPGS and things like digital tabletop displays and holographic projectors. Perhaps one day we'll be fortunate enough to not have to use our pesky imaginations to visualize our adventures, a computer will render the game right down to the interactions with the rope merchant at the bazaar.

It brings to mind the novel Dream Park, by Larry Niven and Steve Barnes. The novel deals with a murder mystery set in a game at Dream Park, a near-future high technology Disneyland that features a live action role playing game, much like Dungeons & Dragons but set in various time periods, played in what amounts to a gigantic doomed soundstage with all sorts of technological gimcracks and doo-dads.

I loved the novel, and the D&D adventurers in cargo cult Polynesia "adventure plotline" is awesome! However, when I think of the elements of the novel and how they relate to gaming, it almost seems like sinister forshadowing.

Hot shot celebrity Gamemasters with planned out set-piece railroad adventures

An "Official" gamer umbrella organization

Flashy, showy visuals

On one hand, when reading Dream Park it seems like the ultimate version of D&D, on the other hand it seems like the worst version of D&D. You fly to california to fight holograms in a dome under the official sanction of the gaming organization? How expensive would it cost to adventure in Dream Park? Whenever I imagined the economics, my Dream Park fantasies fell flat. Something like that could only be experienced by the well-off upper class, aside from ordinary folks those who would save and scrimp and fuck themselves over with credit in order to have the "full gaming experience."

The business graduates who are taking over the "professional end" of the hobby want to sell us Dream Park. They want us to pay to have someone else do the imagining for us. They want us to operate under an "official body." They want to get us addicted into paying for an experience and keep on paying for it.

The old-school role playing that we love will only continue as an "underground phenomenon." I've been involved in the undergound metal/punk scene for decades, and I see the same bullshit in both scenes. The plastic/souless "marketed product" versus the genuine, "poor-yet-virtuous" underound troopers.

The future of Dungeons & Dragons, as I know and love it, is not Dragonforce but with the D.I.Y. hardcore punk band playing a basement show. Ten years from now nobody will be listening to Dragonforce OR playing 4E, as something newer and flashier and cooler will have replaced the obsolete, disposable product.

Perhaps I'm deluded by my own socialist philosopy, but I believe nothing genuine, nothing of truly lasting worth, will come out of the fevered imaginations of business graduates using capitalist machinery to drain every drop of money out of "the gaming consumers."