Oranj / Birthplace of the Ice Elementals

Northern Finland

I've been trying to squeeze in some D&D before the move north. I have three unreported sessions in our whitebox campaign I'm hoping to make write-ups of in the near future - primarily for the sake of the players.

Because of my upcoming move it's likely that last week's session will be the finale for this campaign. The party ultimately found an astrographer in a stalled underworld rent-ship who was able to draw a map to the Dendriton tube. They also found a flying box allowing them to traverse Wiggin's Rent without the costly aid of micro dragons.

I've been using a new character class - Syndaens - which are "modular" fungus / humanoid hybrids that I've been using as NPCs for quite some time. Players can absorb mycelial hyphae into their characters to gain new abilities, and possibly lose old ones. I was frankly inspired by the different regional humanoids in A Voyage to Arcturus which were able to modulate head growths on the protagonist as he traveled from land to land.

Thinking about new settings and scenarios... Inspired by the move to upstate NY I'd like to realize an adventure in the ice. Snow trolls, wayward ice elementals, unsetting suns, icebergs floating in the sea and in the sky, canopies of fleshy ice plants, underground moss gardens, ice breathing potions. What does it feel like for an ice elemental to melt? I heard that in one region near Smithon's Boundary free-living ice elementals have an irresistible desire to feed on warmth. They hunger to dissolve into steam, to transform into gas and to float on the wind.

My Player's Rad Homemade Miniature! IMPROVED PHOTO!

For our whitebox session last Sunday one of the players surprised everyone and brought along a homemade miniature of his character Franklin, Cleric of the Zymosian Time Demon! Check it out:

The player said that the hardest part about making the mini was getting it to stand on it's OWN TWO FEET! How many (non-Lego) minis have you used that stand on two feet? Awesome! The other cool thing is that the mini is wearing plate-mail underpants and you can switch around the torches and weapons!

This player is a crafty guy who does a lot of modeling (check out his blog : archaotics) and also does awesome stop-action animation:

By the way, another player (Mackie the Fighting Man) in the game also does some animation. I'll pimp his work while I'm at it:

How Sleep Spells Turn Adventurers Into Sadists and Executioners

 
I got some emails today from players in my whitebox OD&D campaign. These are snippets regarding our session on Sunday (picture above):

Mackie the Fighting Man: By the way, Michael the Goblin is probably my favorite creature from our journeys so far. He really made me question what I'm doing with my life as a warrior...I still feel guilty for sending him to his death. :(

Cookie the Fighting Beast: P.s. I've also been reflecting on my role as a warrior! Did Michael have a family, what were his passions.....?

Monolaba the Cleric: I still have a few of his fingers if you guys want a little memento.

Franklin the Cleric: Franklin may have had one swig of wine too many and apologizes for abusing Michael and throwing him to a gruesome death (so Michael would have us believe anyway). But let us take comfort in the fact that he is now reunited with Bort, his other unnamed late comrades, and perhaps even his amputated digits. Oh wait, Monolaba still has the fingers? Anyway, it's when we get overly sentimental that we will end up surprised by a tentacle monster with Michael on the saddle.

This exchange is referring to the party's interactions with a goblin they captured named Michael. At one point the party was holed up in a storage room with an unknown number of goblins waiting outside the shut door. The party interacted a bit through the door with Michael, the goblins' spokesman, before deciding to rush out with the magic user ready to cast a sleep spell. When the group swung open the door they indeed put most of the goblins to sleep, killing those that remained standing.

After the battle the party went through the whole throat-slitting ritual that a sleep spell typically entails. They kept one goblin - Michael - as a prisoner. We did a whole episode of first-person roleplaying as the party interrogated the goblin and bickered about what to do with the pitiful creature. The weirdo child chaos cleric Monolaba even cut off some of the goblin's fingers to show how "serious" the group was. Eventually Franklin - a cleric of the Zymosian Time Demon - threw Michael the Goblin through a door full of grasping hairy tentacles. I made Franklin change his alignment from Neutral to Chaotic, by the way.

I don't know about you, but I still get heebie jeebies when PCs mutilate and/or execute prisoners in a game. I know, it goes down all the time, but I still feel weird when it happens. And it almost always happens because of a sleep spell.

A sleep spell is really the perfect instrument for pushing adventurers into uncomfortable ethical dilemmas. Sleep only affects the weakest little enemies - smelly little confused kobolds or grimacing goblinoids wielding rusty butter knives. What does one do with a pile of snoring kobolds? It's not practical for a party to drag along 8 terrified prisoners while trying to carefully explore a dungeon. So, yeah, in their minds players have to trump up the breadcrumb sins of these pathetic dungeon vermin to justify slitting their throats. And what about the one kept as a prisoner? Is it okay, or even fun, to torture it for information? Hold it for ransom? Hold it hostage? If you let it go it will bite your toe and tell its friends! What would Jesus do?

Sleep... a fucking genius instrument for roleplaying, warping kids minds for over 35 years. Let's rejoice that Gygax and Arneson made Sleep instead of something lame like Kill.

Whitebox Sunday - Meet the Syndaens of the Ceiling

Gaming has slowed for me since my first baby arrived this summer. The two D&D campaigns I’ve been running have pretty much been on hiatus. No longer!

 

On Sunday the L.A. whitebox gang reassembled to continue the scary adventure that’s been on pause for 6-7 months now. It was a nice warm, sunny December afternoon when we gathered in an old victorian near Koreatown, had some French pastries, mulled wine, smudged little brown books, lead minis, and the old mint green character sheets.

The party spent the session traversing a catwalk suspended over a large viscous, sparkling underground sea thousands of feet below. The ceiling of the cavern is covered in phosphorescent fungus. In the distance the ceramic city of Wiggin’s Drop hangs from the ceiling.

The party met their first Syndaens – the all-female caste of laborers who tend to the fungus fields on the ceiling of Wiggin’s Rent cavern. The party stumbled upon a mature 8’ tall Syndaen, Naias, and her two 4’ tall clones. The triad was fighting insectoid Harvester monsters on the ceiling. Syndaens wield boomerangs to protect themselves while working the fungus fields. The party decided to join the fight against the Harvesters, afterwards making friends with the Syndaen triad.

It turns out the Syndaen’s were on a quest to extract a mythical male of their race from an ancient and isolated ceiling shrine overtaken long by foul goblins. (I love goblins.) The party joined up to help the Syndaen’s on their quest, and the session ended as the group found a back entrance to the shrine where a wall had been damaged.

I resumed using a DM screen for this session, which is something I've been trying to get away from for a while. I’m still undecided about DM screens. I feel like they put up a psychological barrier between the DM and players, but on the other hand they’re really good for hiding maps and queued-up minis.

An awkward subject came up after the session. Several other folks have expressed interest in joining in this game, but we were all concerned it might be problematic for the group to get too big, both in terms of too many players slowing the game down, and also in terms of the increased difficulty of organizing lots of different people with challenging schedules. We were talking about capping the group at six players... It's sad to exclude fun and interesting people though... Need to think on this more...

Here’s what it looks like when someone casts a difficult spell:

Dendriton Tube

The party has been traveling for days, trying to reach the exit of Dendriton Tube. This is the view looking back down The Tube. In the distance you can see the starrily luminescent underground sea over fifty leagues down. Note the party's camp on the left wall.

A Simple Spell Point System for OD&D

After playing Tunnels & Trolls a few weeks ago I was inspired to draw up a simple spell point system for spell-casting in D&D. In T&T spell casters spend and slowly regain spell-casting points as the game progresses.

First of all I want to say that I love the Vancian Magic paradigm of classic D&D, and I have no desire to alter the original system. Therefore, I present this homebrew spell point system as a new magic user character class - The Oranjian Wizard - which can be played alongside by-the-book Vancian magic users:

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD WHITEBOX / SWORDS & WIZARDRY VERSION

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD REDBOX / LABYRINTH LORD VERSION

The basic idea is that Oranjian Wizards have a seventh Magic Points (MP) attribute which is determined by the character's level. MPs are spent to cast spells. The cost of casting a spell is determined by the spell's level. MPs are recharged every turn at a rate determined by the wizard's level:

So, consider... Given that a first-level spell costs 6 MPs, after an hour of in-game time (i.e. six 10-minute turns),  the MPs will be recharged enough to cast another first-level spell. Obviously, it takes longer to recharge for high-level spells. Hit points may be spent in place of MPs to cast spells. As well, extra MPs may be generated by permanently spending 1 point of Intelligence for 10 MPs.

Also, the normal rule applies that any spells cast MUST be in the wizard's spellbook.

Further options:

•    MPs may be used for other non-spell casting purposes like ability checks and/or saves or operating certain magical devices.

•    Some magic items may affect spell casting costs, alter MP recharge rates, etc.

•    Ability scores may modify MPs (eg. high intelligence might increase number of MPs).

•    The DM may define unique casting costs for specific spells. There may even be versions of spells that have identical effects, but different casting costs. For example, a version of Sleep that costs 4 instead of 6 would be highly sought after.

•    Some spell effects may be scaled up when more magic points are spent.

•    Additional armor types may be allowed, resulting in a penalty in maximum MPs or MP recharge rate.

•    The MP recharge rate may be increased while the wizard sleeps.

•    Some environments may block, retard, or enhance MP recharging.

•    MP recharge rate does not increase in wizards of advanced level. This would significantly decrease the power of high-level wizards.

The Suspended City of Wiggin's Drop

The World Oranj whitebox campaign had a significant change of scenery when the party merged with a Human Door. In addition to finding the wizard Morton's secret workroom and spellbook, they also found their way to a location I Am the Door insisted was a beautiful city called Wiggin's Drop. When transporting to the Wiggin's Drop coordinates the group was surprised to find themselves in a dark and dusty space behind an underground shrine of an unknown race. Exploration eventually brought the group to a crypt where six dessicated corpses of tall gaunt lily-white humanoids were laid out.

At the urging of the magician Scunibro the group moved quickly to find any way DOWN. Eventually they came to a large silver spherical chamber filled with obliviously spinning ghosts. At the bottom of the chamber was a ladder leading down, down, down. The party slid down the side of the sphere, climbed down the ladder, and found themselves on a swaying walkway - The Great Walkwork - suspended high over an underground sea:

The entire cavern was glowing a diffuse amber due to the carpet of phosphorescent fungus covering the ceiling. I Am The Door pointed off into the distance to a gigantic ceramic teardrop-like structure suspended over the sea and said it was Wiggin's Drop City. End of Session.

Travel Through a Human Door

Our last D&D whitebox session took place on a lovely Sunday morning at a friend's house on Mt. Washington. From the hillside we had a great view of the Los Angeles basin while sitting at the playing table. Coffee and mimosas circulated for the ~4 hour session. In the old ramshackle house next door was an acid damaged squatter who was playing weird and quiet improvisations on his Casio keyboard all day. It was actually kind of a nice atmospheric backdrop for the game. After D&D some of us went on a walk through the hills, grilled up dinner, and played some Dominion.

About halfway through the D&D game the party found themselves in a wooden room. They broke through a wall and found the room was surrounded by a large dark space in every direction. The only feature they could detect in the darkness was a pillar a stone's throw away with a 7' tall, thin, and mustachioed man sitting on a chair. The man said his name was "I Am The Door".

It turns out that he was a rare and ancient Human Door. The characters learned that they could merge into the man's torso and be transported through space to different locations. They also learned that, upon invitation, I Am The Door could merge into himself to travel along with the party. Sadly he had been little used for so long - centuries in fact - that he could only remember two locations: (1) a  wizard's chamber isolated deep inside the planet and (2) the way to a place called Wiggin's Drop City. I Am The Door said he could easily learn new locations when provided with appropriate Door Scrolls containing coordinates, however no one in the group had ever seen such a scroll.

And so, after traversing a rope to the pillar in the darkness, the party merged with I Am The Door...

Nice Players' Maps From Whitebox Game

Here are maps drawn by players in our current whitebox D&D game. One player focused on Level 1, while another player picked up Level 2. If interested, you can read session reports and other notes for our whitebox World Oranj campaign to better understand some of the mapped features.

Level 1 of Morton's Compound:

(CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

Level 2:
(CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE)
 

Note the isolated Wizard Room lost in time and space... The players found this during the game last Sunday. I will try to write up a session report some time later this week.

D&D Mycology Handbook: Fungus Caverns I

Fungus caverns are a classic archetype of weird fiction, and have accordingly been incorporated into fantasy roleplaying environments since the birth of the hobby. Although many DMs treat fungus caverns simply as colorful backdrops for spelunking, it is not unknown for some players to want to take a closer look at the mycological wonders surrounding them. To better serve these supernaturalistic gameplay moments, I here begin a series of reports providing some rudimentary details on the ecology and diversity of common subterranean fungi in the world of Oranj.

Consider the mushroom… It is only the transitory fruiting body, the fleeting flesh flower if you will, of a more cryptic and expansive organism that resides in the soil. The main part of the organism is in fact the mycelium – a neural net of fibrous aspect that may extend for inches or miles. Some fungi of Oranj have mycelia that extend not only through the earth, but also across several obscure dimensions of space.

The defining feature of a fungus cavern is the nutrient source of the resident fungi. The fungi of the surface world typically live on decaying organic matter. A paucity of sunlight in subterranean regions translates into a lack of plant matter, which in turn means that there is very little decaying organic stuff to sustain forests of mundane fungi deep underground. The great fungi of the inner sphere instead rely on more unusual strategies for survival:

1. Mycocultural Tracts: Underground mushroom farms are actively maintained by fungus feeding lifeforms. To support this type of agriculture organic material is actively brought into the caverns and applied to the mushroom gardens. The constitutive fungi are usually benign, sometimes delicious. Mushroom farms are usually indicative of a local subterranean agricultural society.

2. Filth Springs of the Inner Sphere: On Oranj there are poorly understood underground reservoirs of organic filth that occasionally bubble through into caverns. These springs of filth often form ponds or lakes of thick oily sludge that can support large patches or even floating islands of fungus. Some of these fungus islands are quite large and ancient, manifesting as massive floating mushroom forests in the deepest caverns.

3. Calxomyces Galleries - Stone Eaters: Certain Oranjian fungi are capable of feeding upon rocks and minerals. Most common of these "stone eater" fungi are the carbonophilic calxomyces. The mycelia of these fungi spread through caverns, actively breaking rock in order to gain access to veins of coal or similar carbon-rich sediments. This bizarre feeding strategy has lead to the creation of vast cavern systems throughout the planet's crust. The multichromatic mycelia of calxomyces can completely cover the interiors of active feeding caverns, producing an otherwordly environment where sensitive travelers can telepathically sense the thoughts of the mycelia. Calxomyces fruiting bodies are large black and purple morel-like growths.

NEXT POST:

Flesh Eating Fungus Nests

Mycelial Brain Cysts

Interdimensional Sporulation Patches

Undead Fungus

Magical Meconium of a Godling - World Oranj Session 3

This ~4hr session was a nice mix of exploration, role-playing, and tactical adventure. Sadly, we also had our first PC death: Sproutface – the only lawful PC in the group. The party found a large treasure stash, including several MU scrolls. Interacting with Loomis, the spurned apprentice, and Little Chief, the captive goblin, brought more clues regarding the nature of Morton’s sidetracked project of reviving a dead godling. With this game we also began playtesting a new Beastmistress class, where advancement leads to gaining special animal-related abilities (inspired by the Gamma World mutation system).

Continuing PCs: Cookie (L1 F), Gorlark (L1 F), Franklin (L1 C), Sproutface (L1 C), Monolaba (L1 C), Scunibro (L1 MU)

NPCs: Mess (Farm Lad), Pipple (Farm Lad), Shiply (Poet)

Welcome New PCs:

Beana – Level 1 Beastmistress (playtesting new character class), has a large curly mop of hair that her pet bird Taka lives in.

Loomis – Level 1 MU, came to ask Morton for an apprenticeship, and rapidly ended up in a floating sphere of Vaseline.

Magical Meconium of a Godling: The party is two levels below ground in a large chamber dominated by a 50’ long stone tub holding a gigantic human head with a tiny limp body floating in oily brown bathwater that smells like meat. Large prisms and lamps, dark, on swinging arm apparatuses flank the tub. Monolaba dips his finger in the brown liquid and tastes it… ‘tase good! A weird high pitch telepathic voice asks Monolaba if he enjoyed the godling’s meconium. Franklin fails a save against spells and is charmed by the voice, who asks him to please feed the head using the crystal hand (see session 1). The brain in the giant head is messing with the group. Cookie restrains Franklin and pulls him into a southern chamber…

Stasis Gel Orbs: A small room with two floating gel orbs and a pool of water with a waterspout going into the ceiling. From each gel orb are rescued two more prisoners of Morton: Beana and Loomis. Much cool first-person role-playing ensued as Beana and Loomis explained how they were each captured by Morton, and what they know about the place.

Water and the Fungus Heifer: The party heads further south into a series of fungus caverns. They pick samples of various species of mushrooms – Purple Chanterelles, Lace Morels, Yellow Roaners, etc. Monolaba took a taste of a Purple Chanterelle and didn’t notice any immediate effects. Exploration and mapping brings some notable discoveries: large ancient statue of amoeboid creature, a small stream falling into a dark cavity, a large shy fungus beast with black ascomycetic eyes retiring in the back of a cavern.

Blood, Gore, Goblins, and Rats: A fairly complex series of encounters occurred where the players learned how to gain access, through a portcullis, to an eastern set of tunnels inhabited by hostile rock goblins. A series of gnarly back-and-forth tactical fights through the tunnels occurred. No characters died, but some were left unconscious or were seriously wounded. Scunibro’s sleep spell helped finish off a good portion of the goblins, and the party took one captive for questing. The little goblin said that the troupe was hired by Morton to help defend and maintain the caverns, and that there were many more goblins remaining. The party set up camp in an easily defendable room for the night. The party was interrupted once in the night by a pair of large rats who were quietly watching the party from the edge of the firelight. Beana spoke with the rats, who said that the goblins were mostly killed (in contrast to the captive’s story). The rats departed, and the party was able to get some rest.

Grod the Magical Goblin and the Deaths of Sproutface and Mess: The next day the party reentered the Goblin cave to try to finish off the creatures. While the party was distracted by a screaming goblin, Grod the Magical Goblin Chief snuck up from behind the party and cast a sleep spell, laying most of the group on the ground. Only a couple players, in a side tunnel, remained awake – they ran as quickly as they could to awaken their companions and attack the small group of goblins now ambushing the party from the other side of the cavern. Ultimately two party members had their throats slit and died: Sproutface (the only lawful PC) and Mess. The party killed off all the goblins except for one, whom they christened “Little Chief” because they promised to reward him the control of the newly emptied cavern in exchange for his assistance. The party looted the goblin’s supply room and Grod’s personal chamber, where they found some of Morton’s scrolls and fine valuables.

So back to town the party headed with the corpses and the treasures…

World Oranj - Session 2

Player Characters:

A mostly chaotic collection of fringe personalities…

• Cookie – A large and unpredictable fighting creature with a lupine aspect and ambiguous gender.
• Franklin – Bearded young cleric with one short arm. Follows the Time Demon of Zymos.
• Sproutface – Cleric, affinity for love, plants, and the Dark Side Demon of Zymos.
• Monolaba – Pre-teen cleric, runaway from wealthy family after envisioning a demon’s face in the moon. A chaotic monster killer, this boy.
• Scunibro – Ex-musician turned student of magic. Unpredictable personality.
• Gorlark – Amnesiac fighting man. Another borderline personality. Has a large scar on his head of unknown origin (amnesia).

In a rural tavern in the hamlet of Fen the party chatted up a group locals. The party ended up hiring two local farming fellows, named Mess and Pipple, to accompany them back to explore Morton’s caverns. The party also gathered some rumors relating to Morton’s occasional travels in the area with two fighting men named Throx and Tinnix. None of the three - Morton, Throx, or Tinnix - had been seen for the last few months. Others rumors suggested another pair of travelers had been through in the last few days also asking about Morton.

The group returned to the caverns with Mess and Pipple tagging along. Extensive exploration, mapping, and adventure ensued. Another cavern with a blue skeleton tree was explored. A passage marked with the freshly decapitated head of a recent adventurer dissuaded the party from further exploration in the southeastern tunnels. At one point an illusory wall of vines was passed through and an underground lake was found. Undead toads with seeking purple tongues were vanquished. A cryptic passage among the limestone was revealed, leading the party to an area guarded by blue crystal skeletons. This turned out to be a more comfortable set of chambers where Morton apparently worked and resided. A few interesting rooms included:

The chamber of geometrized syllabic algorithmic poetry: This chamber hosted a series of stone obelisks with abstract inscriptions of recent syllabic algorithmic poetry, as favored by the current pharmaco-literati of city-state Bryll. Apparently these were very recently composed. Most unusual was a 10’ diameter orb of ochre gelatin floating in the middle of the room. The party pulled a naked human out of the gel who slowly came to consciousness. Scunibro instantly recognized the man to be Shiply Mently Portly Kymus – a renowned algorithmic composer from Bryll who had gone missing almost a year ago. Shiply described how he was shanghaied by poetry-loving Morton and compelled to engage in syllabic compositions and social intercourse with the magician.

A gallery of stimulating paintings: Large paintings of Morton and Shiply engaged in various reclining positions, etc. Shiply, now traveling with the party, refused to acknowledge it was himself in the artworks.

Morton's living quarters: Morton’s personal chambers. Some nice clothing was liberated but nothing of great value was found.

Normandy the Homunculon: The party found a basket in a cupboard. Inside the basket was a fatty greasy hairless head with a large foot where the neck should be. The giggly thing was alive and asked for wine and sausage. When wine was offered up he wet himself out of his little buttocks near his heel – he has a very small stomach you see. His name is Normandy, he is magical and seems to have an intense interest is reading magical inscriptions, however he is not much of a conversationalist. Shiply said he observed Morton working with Normandy in some way in the course of his magical research. Morton called Normandy a “Reminder”. Scunibro, being the only magician in the group, took Normandy along with him in his little basket.

The Myosenian Sofa: A stone bed bearing glowing inscriptions was found. Scunibro and Mess decided to lie on the bed and both immediately gained muscle mass through some magical means. Sadly, the magical charge was depleted upon this use. Scunibro allowed Normandy to read some of the inscriptions on the Myosenian Sofa.

After exploring Morton’s area, the party removed an interior wooden door and returned to the underground sea where they used the door as a float to ferry across to a small beach on the north side of the lake. Beyond an archway the party found a large dark chamber with a translucent half-globe 50’ in diameter. Peering into the half-globe revealed another level, 50’ below, where there was a 30’ long human head laying the darkness, peering up at the party through the glassy bubble. The party fought a bit with wood golems being sloughed off a golem-generating monolith before jumping down a feather-fall shaft that brought them into the room with a giant head.

SESSION 3… TONIGHT at 8pm!

It looks like we will have two more players tonight, bringing the number of PCs to 8, with 3 NPCs.

World Oranj - Session 1

WORLD ORANJ - SESSION 1

The party heard rumors of a magician having recently lost his life. This magician, a minor but respected necroparamathematician called Morton, was rumored to have maintained a special compound not so far outside the players’ city-state. There is a strong possibility that this currently abandoned compound could provide some interesting opportunities for material and intellectual advancement for adventurous and amoral individuals…

An entrance was discovered: The party located the entrance to the compound and solved the puzzle of ingress through an illusory hillside.

A crystal tree and the words of Morton: Upon entering the party found itself in a large limestone cavern with a skeletal blue crystal tree. On one wall a magical speaking mouth welcomed the adventurers.

A large spider attacks and a secret passage is found: After exploring and mapping a variety of tunnels and examining some closed doors, the party was set upon by a vastly overgrown spider emerging from a large crevice in a tunnel wall. After dispatching the spider the party squeezed through the crevice into the spider’s lair – burning its eggs and looting the corpses of previous victims. At the rear of the spider’s lair was hidden passage leading to the…

Hall of ghosts: A huge limestone cavern was filled with hundreds of miniature wooden houses, each less than 8 inches tall. Above each house hovered an apparition of a human spirit. The houses were filled with miniature human bones. The party spent some time talking with some of the ghosts and mapping the cavern. The ghosts politely requested to be freed from the houses by the means of a “crystalline hand”. The party evntually located such a device across an underground river, but sadly it was guarded by three rotten humanoids with transparent skin and paralyzing touch. Difficult melee with these supernatural men liberated the crystalline hand from its small stone alter. Monolaba, the dark spirited boy cleric and super slayer, removed the scalp of one of the guardian creatures and placed it upon his own head. After gaining the quartzish hand, Young Cleric Franklin collected 100 souls into its fractal phalanges, whereupon the hand began to murmur low groans and dark statements not repeatable on this particular internet outlet…

Due to the late hour the party left the cavern and returned to a rural roadside inn to retire.

World Oranj Background

In response to requests from players, I will do my best to post background notes and session reports for our D&D games. There's a bit a catching up to do. First off, here is the background for the World Oranj WhiteBox D&D game in Los Angeles. Also included are some illustrations I made to help clarify some specific points...

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE WORLD

Our Game begins on the World Oranj - a large rainy planet circling a large ocherous sun. This planet has an amber-hued gaseous atmosphere that has the odor of freshly sliced agaric mushrooms. For tens of thousands of years this planet was dominated by a progression of far-reaching human civilizations. Remnants and ruins of these cultures are found everywhere among the forests, swamps, mountains, and seabeds of the world. Over the years, as the various surviving civilizations became more isolated and inwardly focused, the sprawl of humankind declined as wildness retook the world. Currently, the larger portion of remaining humanity is concentrated in a handful of large and isolated city-states that are surrounded by sparsely populated wilderness. Within the city-states the greater bolus of humans maintains an obliviousness to the outer world, focusing instead on complex and decadent artistic, cultural, and pharmaceutical endeavors. Most people spend their entire lives within their city-state, however each progressively shrinking generation produces its own small share of scholars, adventurers, and psychopaths who venture beyond the city walls into the black-leaved forests stalked by translucent beasts.

CHARACTER CLASSES

Clerics: In the sky there is a blue and silver moon called Zymos. This moon appears very large due to its close proximity to Oranj. On Zymos there resides Six Demons living in six ancient temple complexes, respectively. Clerics are able to call on these Demons to gain supernatural favors. While a cleric may call on any of The Six, each cleric has a special association with one of the Demons, usually originating from a dream or vision early in life. Each cleric carries a book of collected meditations and supernatural scripture he or she uses to record and study incantations necessary to invoke favors and spells from the Demons. Clerics are often motivated by a desire to discover lost meditations and artifacts related to the Demons, and, of course, to travel to Zymos to meet the Demons face-to-face.

Fighters: These individuals have spent their lives focused on disciplined physical pursuits - usually violent, athletic, and/or erotic in nature. Fighters are often motivated by a passion for contests and conquests – a disposition often considered to be a sort of mental illness by the good people of the city-states.

Magic Users: Scholars of the ultraphysical sphere, specialists in paramathematics, hypergeometry, and pharmaceutics, magicians practice using their mental abilities to alter the elements around them. They rigorously train regions of their brains to act as storage reserves for physical formulae encoding certain atomic manipulations. Magic users are a strange and rare breed who jealously guard their personal books of spell formulations while seeking out additional knowledge and materials to add to their collections.