I've been a fan of Patrick's blog since way back when he was running Isle of the Unknown for some teenagers. (Hilarious stuff, that.) So I was aware, in an occasional way, that he was working on some pretty keen subterranean materials, that he had a plan in mind.
Fast-forward a couple years: LotFP announced it would become a reality. Huzzah!
I had to wait a few months for the price of the book and shipping, but now I have it and I've been a bit obsessed with Veins of the Earth since it came in the mail. This is no surprise: my entry back into D&D is highly related to hearing someone (Raggi?) interpreting the genre as horror (inept rogues and adventurers delving into abandoned caves, ruins, sewers, and so on with improper equipment and no idea of what lurks in the dark) rather than some heroic fantasy/adventure cycle. I would rather have more influence from The Descent, less from Krull, at least for my adult games.
Of course there are monsters in the book. They are narrative jewels.
And there are alien cultures, thoughtfully presented in a condensed-flavor, rules-free format. This really works for me -gets my creative bits all slippery and generative.
Fast-forward a couple years: LotFP announced it would become a reality. Huzzah!
I had to wait a few months for the price of the book and shipping, but now I have it and I've been a bit obsessed with Veins of the Earth since it came in the mail. This is no surprise: my entry back into D&D is highly related to hearing someone (Raggi?) interpreting the genre as horror (inept rogues and adventurers delving into abandoned caves, ruins, sewers, and so on with improper equipment and no idea of what lurks in the dark) rather than some heroic fantasy/adventure cycle. I would rather have more influence from The Descent, less from Krull, at least for my adult games.
Of course there are monsters in the book. They are narrative jewels.
And there are alien cultures, thoughtfully presented in a condensed-flavor, rules-free format. This really works for me -gets my creative bits all slippery and generative.
So I wanted to run it, of course. I started by generating a few random cave systems as per the written instructions, got some weird results, and then I generated one that I felt could run as-is. I liked the handy bracketed-square notation presented for mapping caves in the book, though I felt as if I was still having a hard time parsing how everything "fit together" in a "realistic" way.
So I painted it.
This is the first cave, complete with a pile of sinkhole rubble where the players will start. This one is extra messy because I started adding game notes in ink, before realizing that I could encode the information, and then share the idea and associated pictures freely, without worry of ruining the horrid surprise for anyone.
Here's some more (all of them are painted, though about half are still awaiting notation):
This is the first cave, complete with a pile of sinkhole rubble where the players will start. This one is extra messy because I started adding game notes in ink, before realizing that I could encode the information, and then share the idea and associated pictures freely, without worry of ruining the horrid surprise for anyone.
Here's some more (all of them are painted, though about half are still awaiting notation):
Click to enlarge.
wow
ReplyDeleteThat's essentially what I said when I started thumbing through the book and slurping up your work, so... yeah, thanks again, glad you think it's wow
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