Bottom Line Up Front: Santa Claus is Dracula. Oh, you want proof? Let’s briefly look at the life of St. Nicholas. (Start with Earth, says Ken. Start with Wikipedia, says I.) Nicholas of Myra, aka Nicholas the Wonderworker – and, as we all know, Dracula was a sorcerer as well as a vampire. He was […]
Tag Archives: Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan
In a hole in the ground… they found a body. I know! Here we are, in the middle of the beautiful, bucolic Riding, with its neat hedgerows and picturesque taverns and delightful crumpet shops and little village greens, and we’ve got a murder to solve! It’d be unthinkable if this wasn’t the third murder this […]
BTravern over on the Pelgrane discord asks if we’re using the Trust mechanics from Night’s Black Agents in the Ocean Game. It’s an excellent idea, since the Ocean Game’s a contest between players and only one person’s going to reach Briny Heaven – but they have to work together until then. So, while the Trust rules […]
There’s a gameplay principle articulated in Burning Wheel called Let It Ride. The idea is that in most situations, when a player scores a success on a test, the player doesn’t need to roll again unless circumstances change. For example, the player’s called to make an Athletics test to climb a cliff in the face […]
The upcoming 2nd edition of 13th Age updates the rules, tweaks the classes, gives lots of useful Icon-related advice – and murders the poor Orc Lord. It’s up to you how the Orc Lord perished in your campaign. The Eyes of the Stone Thief campaign does make quite a few references to the Orc Lord, […]
In celebration of the lovely Spanish translation of the Dossier, some added content for the Campaign That Never Stops. A somewhat dilapidated facility out in the countryside, surrounded by fading gardens. If it’s in the UK, it’s called Milton House; in Romania, Casa Sântoaderi. The aged residents while away their remaining hours watching television, playing […]
One of the more curious subplots in The Borellus Connection involves an Agent attracting the attention of the god Hypnos (p. 035 of the massive tome). We call out several places where Hypnos (or “Samuel Loveman”) might intercede, but if you wish to delve into the perilous regions of slumber, here are some added options: […]
All the pregenerated characters in The Paragon Blade – Conn the Unslain, Aletheia, and Puc – have a supporting cast consisting of a human Companion and an Artefact. Conn travels with his old trainer Genkai and the Paragon Blade; Aletheia has her mechanical owl and her servant Aram, and Puc has the Demon Amulet and […]
Exploring a graveyard under Arkham, detective Martin Harvesson glimpses a hideous goat-headed, cloven-hoofed monster gnawing on a human skull. Stricken with horror, Martin turns and flees blindly down the tunnel – only to emerge into the grand concourse of a huge subway station, a vaulted ceiling of marble arching high above him, and engraved on […]
I was about to write up an article about the weird, quasi-Venician city of Tyros Ashem in the upcoming Paragon Blade setting, but we’ve also got the weird quasi-Venician city of Eversink in Swords of the Serpentine, and the less-Venician-but-even-weirder city of Drakkenhall in 13th Age (doge? No, no, Dragon), which triggered two thoughts in […]