“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” – Arthur C. Clarke Almechanists have the rare skill of mastery over the intersection of technology and magic— the science that blurs the line between the physical and the fantastic. Whether…
Wizards are a strange and reckless lot, treating the laws of nature as mere guidelines. They bend physics to their will, and twist biology like a pretzel. But for every noble pegasus or fearsome minotaur created by these mystical arts, there are hundreds of failures — broken malformed victims of their hubris. Not all of these wretched creatures are given the respite of death. Some live on, left to themselves, and scrabble for survival in a world not made for them.
In dark places, or wild areas unclaimed by other peoples, they gather together to live their lives away from the whims of their wizardly creators. They call themselves Chimerans, but most know them as Cobbleds. They are simple folk who generally avoid settlements where their looks often arouse hatred and violence.
From the child-slaughtering owls of Greek mythology to the oversized mosquitos that Gygax called ‘stirges’, a winged horror that swoops out of the darkness to drain the life from its victims is a well-known trope. Up in ‘aerie, we decided to put our own spin on the creature to give GMs another menace to challenge their heroes.
I looked over the posting from the ‘aerie the other day, and while I can’t say what they wrote was wrong I will say it was kinda gloomy. Sure, labyrinths are usually dark but that don’t mean they have to be uncomfortable.
That’s where I come in. My Underworld Emporium offers everything a discriminating adventurer might need to turn their dungeon crawl into a dungeon swagger.
It has been said many times that the Fantasy Trip is NOT D&D, and is not played the same way as D&D. It rose from the tactical combat skirmish games of Melee/Wizard and does not have the attrition and resource management aspects so prevalent in D&D and its offspring.
We have discussed on more than a few occasions that the lack of baked-in morality structures (like alignments in D&D) is a key feature of the Fantasy Trip. While any thinking creature might act evilly, almost none of the entities listed in the game are categorically evil.
The lack of gods or any divine power is one of the defining characteristics of the Fantasy Trip and — to us at least — one of its greatest strengths. There will always be entities more powerful than the PCs, but the idea of actual gods involving themselves in the campaign can make the players’ own actions seem insignificant.
“On every side of the chamber the walls were alive with nauseous sound – the verminous slithering of ravenous, gigantic rats.” ― H.P. Lovecraft, Tales of H.P. Lovecraft It is said that rats are everywhere, and that is just as…
“I don’t need to bite to fight!” – Viper, ‘Kung Fu Panda’ Of all the intelligent creatures on or under Cidri, few are as feared as the nagiin. Found in all but the coldest regions, these serpent-men stand as…
“Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous.” — Bill Moyers Most Fantasy Trip players — and most gamers in general — try to make their characters are effective as possible, tweaking their options and choices to maximize…
“The interior of our skulls contains a portal to infinity.” — Grant Morrison Fantasy fiction — from the Connecticut Yankee to the D&D cartoon — is filled with tales of people from present-day mundane worlds being transported to different dimensions…
“It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” – Mark Twain For as simple as it is, combat in the Fantasy Trip has a lot of facets. Movement,…
