Author: BriH

Now that I’m back from Malta I’ve had time to ponder the issues of time, civilizations and “ruins” from a RPG perspective. It feels like most of our RPG experience is based on some quasi-medieval concepts: dank tombs, cobwebs, giant spiders and the mandatory undead all dating back to a medieval period; perhaps 500-1000 years past.. But what if those ruins and labyrinths were thousands, or tens of thousands years old? What about 100,000 years old?

In a previous blog post, I suggested modifying the immense Shadow World timeline by shortening the Interregnum period from approximately a 100,000 year span down to perhaps 10,000 or 20,000 years. Why? Shadow World features a number of ancient Althan, Worim, Jentini and Taranian structures and artifacts that need to be 50,000 to over 100,000 years old. Kulthea is not an inert planet and features tectonic activity and cataclysmic events (like comets) that wreak havoc on the surface. It beggars belief that any structure could survive 100,000 years or more, and yet we have just that with these ancient civilizations. We can certainly hand wave this away, or lean on “magical” explanations for the longevity and functionality of these structures. I’ll throw my ideas out that might account for that a bit later, but I wanted to toss a few real life examples to put things in perspective:

2500BC The Great Pyramids of Giza. The only surviving of the “Seven Wonders of the Ancient World” the Pyramids are perhaps the best example of an ancient structure that still retains most of it’s form factor (excluding the polished casing stones). But these are only 4500 years old–they would be “recent” history in Shadow World and only centuries into the Third Era!

3600BC Hagar Qim. This is Hagar Qim in Malta. The first picture gives the impression that while still impressive, the rock walls are somewhat primitive in fit and quality. However, if you look at the second sketch, just hundreds years ago, the walls were in much better shape and appear to be tightly fitted dressed stone. Sketches of the site from even further back make the temple even more impressive and enigmatic given it’s purported age! One take away is the impact of weathering on those limestone blocks–the temples were buried for thousands of years and once uncovered, much of the stone deteriorated rapidly–in just a few hundred years! Without considerable conservation efforts most of these temples will be a pile of unimpressive stone in just decades or a few centuries.

7500BC. About 1/2 way through the Second Era. Çatalhöyük, Turkey. This ancient village is estimated to have a population of 5,000 to 7,000 people; all the buildings seem to be residential with no apparent “public” buildings. Overall, the construction seems fairly crude and simple and most of the site is destroyed or eroded with foundations and little left after 9,000 years.

7500 BC. (Second Era) Nabta Playa. Located in Egypt this site is believed to be of astronomical site similar to Stonehenge or the Goseck Circle in Germany. While incredibly old, it is clearly eroded and generally not “impressive” in the way that one might expect of a 2nd Era Shadow World complex.

9000BC or the early part of the 2nd Era of Shadow World. Gobekli Tepe. Pushing up against the Younger Dryas boundary at 12,000 years old, Gobekli Tepe predates humanity’s oldest known civilizations! And as impressive and enigmatic the site it, compared to Shadow World it’s almost new!

Certainly, most gamers might care little for this level of archeological realism, but this is just one aspect of Shadow Worlds timeline that might be considered problematic. Why might ancient Shadow Structures fare better than earthly counterparts?

1. Advanced materials. Certainly the Althans were a technological society and developed material sciences to at least tech level 10+. It can be assumed that these construction materials and techniques would last far beyond what we could comprehend.
2. Magical Materials. Laen, Eog and other enchanted metals and alloys are immune to rust, degradation or aging.
3. Restoration. Long lived races like the Elves will have retained advanced building skills and continual rebuilt or restored ancient structures.
4. Magic. That solves everything!
5. Burying. Gobekli Tepe, the Malta temples and many other surviving ancient structures have lasted because they have been preserved underground. So it’s conceivable that subterranean structures (like the Taranian subshuttle system) would have considerable longevity without the deleterious effects of surface erosion and exposure.

So even pushing into speculative or fringe science, sites like Tiahuanaco, Bolivia which are argued to be 17,000 years old, are still relatively recent compared to Althan and Ka’ta’viir structures.

In my own campaign and found in Priest-King, the only surviving Althan city on Kulthea is Auraax-Centra. Over 100,000 years old and lying is shallow waters, it is has survived due to construction materials and repair “nanobots”. But it’s still mostly rubble and debris! But Terry’s SW also features a number of operational Ka’ta’viir structures and installations with working tech. It’s all great material for the setting, but does the timeline need to be that long? Can we snip a few thousand years here and there to make it more accessible?

What are your thoughts and does it matter? Unless your players have some in depth knowledge of SW’s history, “Ancient Pre-history” can just be “very old” in practical game terms.

I’ve been writing frequently about the Earthwardens in Shadow World. Not only do I find them a viable link between the techno-magic of the Ka’ta’viir and the “arcane magic” of Shadow World, they also represent a mysterious shadowy past also present in our history.

So Monday I’m heading to Malta to explore the ancient megalithic temples found there. Much is mysterious there, and history continued with the Knights of Malta and even more recently with the German invasion during WWII (I’m a history buff!)

I’m excited and I know this will spur my imagination and creative in the coming months! If you are intrigued by the Earthwardens as well, please read my blog posts and add your own thoughts and insight.

Back in 2017 the Rolemasterblog created a writers challenge for ourselves to write 50 adventures/hooks over a 50 week period. Basically 1/week to be published on DrivethruRPG as d100 adventures.

By almost every measure it was a great success and those adventures are still selling to this day! Many of mine were cribbed from my Shadow World campaign, but The Inn of Dusk was written specifically for this challenge.

Now, 5 years later, it has hit “Electrum status” based on sales volume. (not sure how many units are needed for that…)

Our second attempt at 50in50 sputtered out a bit due to COVID, but I think it might be worth revisiting!

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/234207/The-Inn-of-Dusk

It’s odd how creativity works isn’t it? Like many of you, I have multiple writing projects in the works and while I plan on finishing one, I end up getting distracted and start working on something else!

One project I “finished” was my Shadow World Religions Handbook, but after some review I realized that I had left out some useful information that would have been easy to include.

So given that I’ve been compiling some past encounters I’ve used in my campaigns, plus some NPC’s and other adventure hooks to integrate various SW religious organizations into an adventure. All told, I want to have at least 3 “hooks” or encounters for each religion covered in the handbook.

The goal of course is not to get distracted by some other project, but my goal is still 2 pages/day.

I have not posted for several months, but diligent in watching other posts here and on the Rolemaster Forums. What are your thoughts? We have done well with this blog, but if users migrate to the official RM Forum, what should we do??

What is our role here and Shadow World?

One of the enjoyments of reading Terry’s Shadow World books, is finding a interesting but vague tidbit that just cries out for more detail. I previously blogged about one such nugget, the Mazatlak Pillar City, and today I wanted to speculate on the Clycallah War Machines.

There are only a 3 mentions of mentioning or relating to these War Machines in the Master Atlas:

5977: Gaalt: [Clycallah archeologists discover a
Wôrim underground vault containing strange
vehicles.]

5983: The Raven Queen’s armies first encounter
the Clycallah war machines, rebuilt from ancient Wôrim designs. They are routed by the huge walking mechanical terrors. Later encounters are inconclusive

Gaalt: The Raven Queen launches a new assault,
this time led by land and air drakes, each
with a Quaidu rider. They prove an even match
against the Clycallah war machines.

That’s not much to go on, but it definitely sparks the imagination. From these few points we can conclude that:

1. These are mechanical not magical–they are not Constructs but “technology” of some sort.
2. They move by walking rather than wheels or tracks.
3. They are “huge”.
4. They are built using Wôrim designs. This implies that they Clycallah had the technological capacity to build these machines, but it also hints that they are “rebuilt” so perhaps they fixed older inoperable machines.

Where is Clycallah? Per the Master Atlas, it is in Gaalt:

G. Clycallah: [Cool Temperate/Seasonal–Wet &
Dry] Laan (Mixed economies/Republic (TL:6-7).
This little realm would have fallen long ago to
Gaalt but for two things: the powerful Mages
among the Laan, and their machines. The
Clycallah’s war machines (based on Wôrim
technology) strike terror into even the Raven
Queen’s elite forces, and they are powerful
enough to defeat her Troll warriors.

Who are the Wôrim? Again we are left with only a few references that they were a vanished, technologically advanced race during the Interregnum:

c.-30,000 – -20,000: The Wôrim empire, centered
in Gaalt, is founded and expands rapidly
and is soon at odds with the Jinteni and Elven
populations.

What else do we know? Per the Master Atlas we also have some possible conflicting info that:

The Lydians might be descendants of the Wôrim

Trogli might be descendants of the Wôrim

The Wôrim might be the pre-cursors to the Laan.

Other than that, there is little, if any, real data on the Wôrim. Unlike the Jinteni which were fleshed out quite a bit in Emer III, we only have a few more hints on the Wôrim found in the Haalkitaine book:

Corridors: Most of the tunnels correspond to the usual
Wôrim trapezoidal profile with periodic buttresses of a
grey stone. Some sections were cut from solid granite,
but where there was only earth the halls were faced with
granite slabs. It is these areas — mostly to the west —
that have deteriorated the most. There are many caveins
caused by water seepage from the sewers; some have
opened cracks between the two networks while some
have shifted or even completely blocked corridors.
Also typical of the Wôrim, there is little decoration or
engraved writing; the stone cutting is precise and starkly
angular. The only apparent written records are etched on
the oval metal canisters which hold the bodies — and those
are the as-yet undeciphered dot patterns believed to be
the Wôrim written language.

Anyway, circling back to the Clycallah War Machines, we are left wondering about it’s abilities. Clearly it must have some offensive capacity–it is called a “War Machine” and they can battle with Dragons! Chemical reactions are not reliable on Kulthea, so traditional explosive weaponry seems unlikely. The Jinteni had energy weapons–perhaps these War Machines were armed with laser guns!

What are your thoughts? Have you ever introduced Clycallah War Machines in your campaign? What do you think they look like? What type of weapons could you imagine they have?

Unfortunately, in my attempts to contact Rolemaster and Shadow World authors, I discovered that Tim Taylor had passed away in 2020. Tim was quite prolific in the late 80’s and early 90’s and had 3 Shadow World modules published and contributed to a number of Rolemaster products.

His obituary:

Tim Scott Taylor November 30, 1959 – November 8, 2020 Tim S. Taylor was born November 30, 1959 in Berea, Ohio to James and Ruth Taylor. He grew up in Columbia Station, Ohio, outside Cleveland. He died at home November 8, 2020 in Port Townsend, Washington after a brief struggle with cancer. Tim attended Columbia High School, graduating in 1978, and Ohio State University where he received undergraduate degrees in history and philosophy with a minor in mathematics. He was especially interested in military history, strategy and tactics, game theory, role playing games and board games. He was a lover of eclectic music. He greatly enjoyed sharing his music with friends and found joy in introducing people to board games of all sorts as well as role playing. In the 1990s Tim worked as a disc jockey at WICR radio station in Indianapolis where he hosted radio shows including “Time Without Meaning” featuring music he mixed live in the studio, and “Around the World in 60 Minutes”. Tim also worked as a proofreader and layout tech at Macmillan Publishing in Indianapolis. A Tibetan Buddhist, Tim volunteered many hours at the Tibetan Cultural Center in Bloomington, Indiana. He was a close friend of Thubten J. Norbu, a Tibetan lama and refugee from Chinese oppression in Tibet. Tim served for several years as Prof. Norbu’s personal secretary, writing articles, letters and speeches for him. Tim arrived in Port Townsend, Washington in 1999. He volunteered for a year at the PT Public Library and worked at Ravenstone Tiles, an art tile company in town. He was also a writer and game designer. Tim designed and published several war games, wrote books and articles, created a deck of Tarot cards inspired by a dream, and wrote fantasy role playing modules. In the last couple years of his life he went by the name ‘Crow’ and dressed all in black. He had many friends in the area and gave Tarot readings, which seemed uncannily accurate, at the Cellar Door in downtown Port Townsend. Tim/Crow was preceded in death by his father James Taylor. He is survived by his mother Ruth Taylor, sisters Tammy Taylor and Toni Cassidy, brothers-in-law Pete Wieneke and Ed Cassidy, three nieces and three nephews, and his long-time friend and housemate Laura Reutter.

I wish I had the chance to interview Tim, it sounds like he led an interesting life.

This blog series started in my post on the relationship between Shadow World and the Rolemaster Companion I. That got me thinking a bit more about a topic that was percolating in my head for a number of years: what would the
Essaence powers of the Ka’ta’viir and Earthwardens look like exactly. In the first part of this blog series, I did a quick review of existing Arcane spells lists found in the first 4 Companions.

What would these proto-spell lists developed by the Ka’ta’viir and ultimately the Earthwardens look like? I think it’s illustrative to see what Terry says about the Earthwardens and what they did. We know that:

-They were a group of Ka’ta’viir that left Kulthea, were trapped in a time dilation and only returned after Kulthea was laid waste.

–They created Essaence artifacts like Flute Keys, Twig Bridges and Shell Shields and magical crystals, but they also constructed the Coral Roads, Sea Tunnels and left megalithic structures and Guardians throughout the hemisphere.

The powers in that second section above are very much in line with the central ideas of Arcane Magic, but we also know that the Earthwardens had the knowledge and technology of the Althan/Ka’ta’viir civilization as well. In my SW campaign, the Earthwardens are one “splinter group” of the Ka’ta’viir that returned to Kulthea. These groups were not monolithic, but were general philosophies within the group as follows:

Erudites. These members were more focused on developing their knowledge of Essaence and science and it’s believed they initiated the early separation of the realms of Essence and Mentalism.

Elementalists. The Ka’ta’viir delved into the fundamental and raw powers of the Elements and manipulation of the physical world. Much of their legacy is found in the Magician Base lists.

My goal was to define and finish 10 Arcane lists f or use by the Earthwardens. The goal was to encompass most of the powers hinted at by Terry and be illustrative of early magic before the split into the three basic realms.

My rough ideas with loose spell list titles:

1. “Creations”. This list would encompass the various magical creations attributed to the Earthwardens: shaping crystals, sentinels, golems, flutes and similar artifacts.
2. “Essaence Mastery”. Spells related to Foci, Flows, travelling, recharging PP’s.
3. “Dimension Mastery”. Making of gates, interdimensional travel and similar powers.
4. Shapechanging. Basically a polymorph list leading up the higher level “Mage-drake” spell and the Ritual of Ascension.
5. “Time Mastery”. I wrote a time spell list for BASiL, but it really feels like it needs to be a Arcane list. Given the Earthwardens history with time dilation, it’s logical that they would master time via Arcane magic. Plus chronagenic statis tech is a SW element.
6. “Mana-fires”. I will skew this more towards plasma, but it’s feels like a good foundation for later Elemental Essence spells.
7. “Earthworks”. The Earthwardens had the power to build megalithic structures, major earthworks and similar edifices. More than Earth Law, this should be epic in scope. These spells would encompass stone, metal etc.
8. “Sound Mastery”. This needs more thought, but there is something here that feels very ancient and fundamental. Ideas include levitation, disintegration etc.
9. “Life Mastery”. The Lords of Essence created and manipulated many living beings. This might be too similar to Shapechanging…
10. “Words of Power”. I’ve always felt that instantaneous words of Power needed to be Arcane (and require Iruaric or Kugor)
11. “Warding”. Many of the Earthwardens works included protective powers. This would be protective magic: prototype of wards, runes, symbols etc.
12. “Physics”. BASiL also has a physics mastery list I might revise and include given the Lords of Essence’s technology level.

In part 3 I’ll have the finished draft lists. But for now, can you think of any “proto-magic” that should be included and fits with the Earthwardens and Lords of Essence in Shadow World?

It seems almost ironic that a blog covering RPG’s has difficulty in finding new contributors. Right? Roleplaying games are a purely creative endeavor, a collaboration story-telling among it’s player and referee participants. By nature an improv process.

We have been lucky here at the Rolemasterblog in having a number of great contributors over the last 8 years (is that right Peter?). We want more bloggers! D&D and other systems have dozens and dozens of blogs–Rolemaster has a couple at best. Competitive disadvantages compel the few survivors to circle the wagons and join talents. Rolemaster was a powerhouse in the industry–even if that might not happen again, it still deserves a strong forum for ideas and advocacy. I see great ideas, thoughts and even discussion topics over at the Rolemaster Forums–many of those ideas can be expanded upon in a blog.

I have reached out to few people about writing for the Rolemasterblog. These are creative, talented and experienced GM’s–masters of the RPG craft after decades of gaming. Why won’t they write a blog post or two? Everyone has a difference answer: no time, don’t want to be criticized, aren’t confident writers, don’t want their players to read the blog for insight etc.

I would only point out that outside perspective is important. Potential new players, curious about “old school games” will google “Rolemaster”, “Shadow World”, “MERP” among others. If they see new, fresh content, they will click on it. They will believe that Rolemaster is still relevant. Let’s show them why.

If you have an idea, want to discuss your thoughts in a more public forum, or share the creative parts of your campaign or game, write for us! Contact Peter, he can set you up with access and the Rolemasterblog will grow as a blog and Rolemaster may be helped in the process. Isn’t that what we all want?

RPG Review’s latest edition focuses on ICE. Check it out HERE.

https://rpgreview.net/node/318

And I’m sure Colin posted this on the forums, but he did an interview with Wolfshield Games HERE.

The Rolemasterblog.com is currently ranked #45 of RPG Blogs. (I think we got into the 30’s a few years back.) You can see that HERE.

https://blog.feedspot.com/rpg_blogs/