Archive
Normal Service will be Resumed Shortly
I’m going through a rough patch, both personally and professionally. I had intended to post on the never-released GW Frankenstein game, but time got away from me. Soon, I promise.
For now, here’s an update on my Monster of the Month Club Patreon campaign. Please back it if you can – even $1 a month makes a difference – or buy me a coffee at https://buymeacoffee.com/graemedavis.
Anything is greatly appreciated.
Here’s the most recent post:
The Pooka is now posted for paying members, and voting is open for November’s Monster of the Month! Choose from:
1. Banshee
3. Hag
4. Basilisk
5. Redcap (Borders ogre type)
Vote in the community channel that corresponds to your membership level!
WFRP 1 Memories: Deities and Religion, Part 3
Welcome to the third part of this series on my work developing the Old World pantheon for WFRP first edition. Last week, I looked at the Northern, or Country Gods. This week, their more sophisticated counterparts: the Southern, or Town Gods.
As I’ve said before, the process of creating and developing these deities took place in a rush and with little or no planning. That makes this series anything but a masterclass on creating deities for a fantasy setting. It is what happened, though, to the best of my recollection, so treat it for what it’s worth: part history and part cautionary tale.
The Southern Gods, or Town Gods, consist of Verena, Myrmidia, Shallya, Morr, and Ranald. Most, but not all, are based on Graeco-Roman deities from Earth, which is why I thought of them as the Southern Gods. Their worship would have spread into the Empire through trade and mercenary service and stayed mainly in the cities, which is why I thought of them as the Town Gods.
Verena
Verena started out with a completely different name and personality. In Rick’s draft, she (I don’t remember his name for her) was a very domestic goddess of home and family, clearly based on someone’s mother. There were cult passwords that involved the price of eggs, and looking back I should have taken this goddess and developed her for the Halflings, and then created Verena from scratch. As it happened, that’s pretty much what I did: although I wasn’t aware of doing it at the time, the results are the same.
Many people have observed, quite rightly, that Verena was inspired by Athena in her role as the patron deity of Athens. I gave her the owl as a symbol, standing for wisdom just as it did on Athenian coins of 2300 years ago, and the sword and scales of justice because she was also partly based on the more abstract Roman deity Justitia, whose statues can be found atop court houses across the western world.
My intention was to establish Verena (whose name I fudged from the Latin veritas, for truth) as a patron of knowledge for wizards and other academics as well as a deity of truth and justice. I had an idea for an order of Verenan templars who traveled the remoter parts of the Old World like the knights errant of chivalric romance, hearing complaints and dispensing justice as they went. I even had a name for them – the Knights Justiciar – though I never had the opportunity to write them up properly. I’ll add them to the list of possible future blog posts.
Morr
Morr lacks the clear Classical antecedents of Verena and Myrmidia, but I made him a Town God because I wanted him and Verena to be married, with Myrmidia and Shallya as their twin daughters, each reflecting their parents’ interests in a different way.
Morr originally came out of a conversation with Jes Goodwin, in which we established his link to ravens, his gates of death emblem (inspired in part by the Gates of Morpheus from Greek myth) and his resemblance to the late actor Sir Christopher Lee. We needed a protector of the dead and a patron for vampire hunters and similar characters, and I must admit I had far too much fun with his cult -especially in Apocrypha 2, where I developed the Mourners’ Guild to oversee funerals and protect burial grounds and the Raven Knights to hunt undead. This was long before the Vampire Counts and the Tomb Kings of Khemri came along, and Warhammer undead were far less organized.
His name, as many have observed, is drawn from the Latin mors, meaning death. Originally it had an accent over the o – Mórr – at Jes’s suggestion, but over the years that became too much trouble for typesetters and he became just plain Morr.
So, why was he married to Verena? Read on…
Myrmidia
Looking at Ulric (covered in the previous instalment), I thought he made a splendid god for berserkers and warriors, but I felt that there should also be a deity to cover more scientific, strategic approaches to warfare. So, I created Myrmidia. Her name came from the Myrmidons, the elite company led by Achilles in Homer’s Iliad (and incidentally, the level 6 title for fighters in the AD&D first edition Players’ Handbook). In some of the flavor text I wrote for Warhammer Siege and other books, Tilean mercenaries and others would regularly swear by “Mamma Myrmidia,” showing how popular her worship was in the south of the Old World.
Myrmidia herself was unapologetically based on Pallas Athena, the Greek goddess in her martial aspect, and that is one reason I decided to make her a daughter of Verena. Morr became her father because I saw scientific warfare standing at the intersection of wisdom and death: she applied her mother’s wisdom to the process of filling her father’s kingdom.
Shallya
Another obvious vacancy in the Old World pantheon was for a deity of healing. Although WFRP Clerics weren’t as strongly typecast into the role of healers as their D&D counterparts, it was already evident that combat in WFRP was going to be a dangerous business, making the need for magical healing all the more urgent.
Shallya is not based on an particular deity from Earth’s mythologies, although I did think a little of Isis (who restored her husband Osiris to life after his jealous brother Set cut him into tiny little pieces and scattered them the length and breadth of Egypt). Other mythologies had other candidates, such as Dian Cécht from the Irish Tuatha Dé Danann, but I liked the idea of Myrmidia and Shallya being sisters. Shallya embodied a different combination of her parents’ interests, using her mother’s wisdom to ensure that no one had to enter her father’s realm before it was their time.
Her name was completely made up. I just formed a soft, soothing kind of sound in my mind and turned it into a name. Tony Ackland never tired of teasing me about it, suggesting that she should have a sister named Shan’t-ya – but by that time the name was already in print, and it’s remained there ever since!
Ranald
Ranald was one of Rick’s creations. At the time, there were two famous criminals named Ronald – Great Train Robber Ronald Biggs and feared London gangster Ronald Kray – which is where he got the name for this patron of thieves. I expanded on his initial concept quite a bit, making Ranald a protector of the poor and downtrodden as well as of thieves and other criminals. I added the concept of neighborhood shrine clubs and charitable donations, and laid out different aspects of the god according to who worshiped him and why.
I had wanted to explore the idea of a deity having multiple aspects further, but there wasn’t time to do so in the core book. It was another task that was deferred until we could do Realms of Divine Magic, and of course that never happened.
Another thing that never happened was my proposed book of Old World myths, which is a shame because I had in idea for Ranald’s origin myth that I longed to write up. In this telling, Ranald was a mortal thief, con artist, and all-round rogue who seduced soft-hearted Shallya by convincing her that he would die unless she made him immortal – which she did, whereupon he gleefully abandoned her and took his criminal activities to a higher level until other criminals – and the poor upon whom he bestowed some of his haul in the manner of Robin Hood – began to worship him and he became a full-fledged god. This explains, among other things, why the cults of Ranald and Verena are traditional enemies.
So there we are: that’s the Southern Gods. Next time, I’ll look at the lesser gods.
Let me know what you think in the comments!
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Ask Me Anything, Part 1
Just posted on the Monster of the Month Club’s Patreon page: the first in my monthly Ask Me Anything series for free and paying members. Leave your questions in the comments (or in a comment here, if you prefer) and I’ll answer as many as I can. https://www.patreon.com/MonsteroftheMonthClub
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WFRP Memories: Deities and Religion, Part 2
Welcome to the second post in the series on my work developing the Old World pantheon for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay’s first edition.
Keen-eyed readers have noticed over the years that the deities of the Old World – as distinct from the Gods of Law and Chaos and the deities sketched out for nonhumans in the WFRP 1 rulebook – owe more than a little to those of European mythologies. In particular, some are reminiscent of Graeco-Roman gods and others are clearly inspired by Norse or Celtic mythology. This was intentional (if not particularly systematic, as you’ll see), and I felt it was in keeping with the cultural similarities between the Old World’s nations and those of late Medieval Europe.
As I worked on fleshing out the handful of deities who had already been named and filling the most glaring gaps in the pantheon, I found myself dealing with the differences between the two groups. I came to think of them as the Northern Gods and the Southern Gods – or sometimes, the Town Gods and the Country gods, based on the idea that the Old World’s cities would be more cosmopolitan than the rural areas and the cults of the ancient Classical civilization (visualized as an amalgam of Greek and Roman influences) would have spread into the cities through trade and mercenary service.
This time, though, I’ll be focusing on the Northern Gods and showing how they developed into the forms presented in the WFRP 1 rulebook and other first edition sources. Full disclosure: it was a very rapid, ad hoc process, as you’ll see. This series isn’t a masterclass in designing deities and pantheons, by any means – but it will be an insight into what actually happened, as accurately as I can remember it after all these years.
So, to quote the BBC children’s radio programme Listen With Mother from the dim and distant recesses of my early childhood, “Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.”
The Northern Gods, or the Country Gods, consist of Manann, Taal, Rhya, and Ulric. The Old Faith, followed by the Druids who were cut from Warhammer canon somewhere between WFRP’s first and second editions, was based on the worship of Taal and Rhya, but was only followed in the remotest areas.
Taal
Taal, the god of wild places and the patron of Talabheim, was in the early draft that I developed. I think he was created by Rick Priestley. I developed him with the Celtic Cernunnos and the wiccan Horned Lord in mind, as many people have observed.
In the myth I wrote for the opening pages of Warhammer City, I made him the older brother of Ulric. He had previously been named, albeit indirectly, as the patron of the remote monastery of La Maisontaal (“the House of Taal”) in the mountains that separated the Empire from Bretonnia. Rick had created this location for the scenario The Vengeance of the Lichemaster in the third Citadel Journal, which was published just a few weeks before I arrived at Games Workshop in May of 1986, and it was re-used a few years alter in Carl Sargent’s WFRP sequel, Flame Publications’ Lichemaster.
Taal’s name remains unchanged from that early draft, and I’m sorry to say I don’t know what inspired it. I certainly can’t see a way to derive it from the name of any mythological deity from Earth. If I had to guess, I’d say that the name of Talabheim was established first, and Taal was named to match as the city’s patron deity.
Rhya
Having a perfectly serviceable Horned Lord and god of the wilds, my mind immediately went to the question of a consort. In wiccan lore and the ancient traditions on which wicca is based, the Horned Lord and the Goddess are consorts, reflecting the bounty of the earth as well as the animals that depend on it. In my mind, there had to be an earth-mother goddess, not only to maintain this dualistic view of nature but also because the game included Druids and in my mind they had to follow a more ancient religion – ideally one with a Celtic/wiccan feel.
The name “Rhya” is not based on any name from mythology. From time to time, when inspiration eluded me, I would simply pick a syllable or two that felt like they would work. Calling her “The Goddess” in the wiccan and neopagan style, I felt, risked confusing readers who were not as familiar with these real-world sources as I was. She needed a name, and I needed to come up with one fast, so Rhya it was.
I never had occasion to use Rhya in anything I wrote for WFRP 1, though a little while ago I did mention her as a possible patron for the Viydagg when I wrote that old Citadel miniature up for WFRP 4 on this blog, replacing the vague assertion in the WFRP 1 rulebook that the Viydagg was a Demon (to use the first edition spelling) of Law. I’ve come to believe that she makes a much better avatar or servitor of Rhya, the source of life and fertility.
Ulric
My memory fails me on the origins of Ulric. Part of me wants to say that he was already in the early draft of the core book as the patron of Middenheim, mirroring the role of Taal as the patron of Talabheim. Another part wants to say that Ulric didn’t exist before we started planning the city section of Power Behind the Throne, which became so extensive that is was published separately as Warhammer City. I have a vague idea that Phil came up with the name, possibly as a riff on Elric even though Ulric had far more in common with Conan, the other Greatest Fantasy Warrior of the time.
Be that as it may, Ulric was conceived from the start as a war god. People have seem glimpses of the Greek Ares, the Norse Thor, Robert E. Howard’s Conan, and others in the early descriptions of him. His association with wolves and winter came, I think, from Jim and Phil: no one seemed to mind at the time that the phrase “the White Wolf” brought to mind both Michael Moorcock’s Elric and the fledgling game publisher that would shortly become huge by publishing Vampire: The Masquerade and the other World of Darkness games (and who had also stolen the name from Moorcock).
As I’ve already said, I was thinking in terms of pantheons rather than individual deities. I wanted to establish relationships between the various deities that would inform the relationships between their mortal followers. I wanted family dynamics, as we see in the soapier Greek myths, and I wanted to develop actual myths that could be published in a rules-free background book with plenty of gorgeous art. The opening myth in Warhammer City was as far as I got down that particular road, but I submitted more than one proposal to GW management, all of which were ignored.
Manann
Manann was the deity on whom I spent the least time, back in 1986. There had been much talk of ports and long-distance trade. I think – but I’m not certain – that the idea of a Marienburg sourcebook was first mooted about this time, three years or more before the first instalment appeared in White Dwarf.
At any rate, the Old World’s merchants and explorers needed a sea god, so I grabbed the name of the Irish Manannan mac Lir and built a sea god as quickly as I could. His five-pointed crown, as far as I recall, was intended to evoke a multi-pronged fishing spear like Poseidon’s trident, and I threw in the name Mathlann as an Elvish variant because the Sea Elves were potentially going to be developed just as soon as we got to write a supplement on ocean voyages and the lands beyond the Old World – which, of course, we never did.
And that’s all I can remember about the Northern Gods. I don’t recall any plans for developing others, though at various points there was a plan to develop a Norsca supplement, and I would probably have wanted to expand this pantheon there, if it had happened. I do recall seeing a manuscript submission for a Norsca supplement, which I thought had been written by Paul Vernon, but in the second part of his interview on the Awesome Lies blog he says he only discussed Norsca with GW management, but didn’t actually write anything.
Next week, I’ll cover the Southern Gods, for which I had a little more of a coherent plan – but only a little more. Until then, I’ll look forward to your comments!
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The Monster of the Month Club: Try Before You Buy
Back in December, I launched a Patreon project called The Monster of the Month Club. It’s still a little wobbly on its legs, and I’m planning a lot of improvements, but the first three products are available for paying members. Plus, there are various other posts for paying members, free members, and the general public.
There are also several freebies, including an FAQ, a sample creature, and the Conversion Guide to help you derive stats and rules for your tabletop rpg of choice from the club’s unique system-agnostic description format.
The Monster of the Month Club is slowly building momentum, but of course new members are always welcome. You’ll find links below, but here are some free downloads so you can take a look, try the system out (and send feedback – please!), and hopefully like it enough to join!
If you’d like to know more about the project, here’s the backgrounder that I’ve been sending out to the gaming press. Hopefully you’ll start seeing reviews and announcements soon.
Links
Here are all the ways to reach the Monster of the Month Club online. I hope to see you there!
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/MonsteroftheMonthClub
Discord: https://discord.gg/J3dbnav5YJ
Email: [email protected]
Bluesky: @motmclub.bsky.social
Instagram, Threads: @motmclub
As someone once said, “the journey of ten thousand miles begins with a single step.” I hope you’ll enjoy the monsters as much as I do, and join me!
Detlef Sierck Presents: Theater of Blood
It’s been a while since the last “Detlef Sierck Presents” post, and this time I’m writing about something that inspired me rather than something that might inspire you. Although it might inspire you, and I hope it does.
If you’re familiar with my WFRP 4th edition adventure collection Rough Nights and Hard Days, you might have caught the Vincent Price reference in the third adventure “A Night at the Opera.” Yes, I know the title is a Marx Brothers reference – or Queen, or both – but that was just misdirection. The characters of Edvard and Edwina Lowenhertz were based directly on those played by Vincent Prince and Diana Rigg in this 1973 revenge comedy: Edward and Edwina Lionheart.
The plot is simple but effective, allowing for an episodic structure with some wonderful set pieces. Failed Shakespearean actor Edward Lionheart (Price) takes revenge on the critics he blames for sinking his career, with the aid of his devoted daughter (Rigg, often in slightly hilarious drag as a mustachioed young man in sunglasses), killing each one in the style of a notable – and highly theatrical – Shakespearean death. The film is typically campy, as a comedy about grisly murders has to be, and Price’s performance might not be for everyone in a modern audience, but for a game with the right tone – like Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay or Shadow of the Demon Lord – the humor works perfectly.
That’s why I swiped the plot for “A Night at the Opera.” I won’t post any spoilers, but the plot and tone made me smile, and I hope that anyone who picked up on the reference while playing the adventure got a laugh out of it as well.
If this sounds like your cup of hemlock, look for it on your favorite streaming service. If you’re unconvinced or just curious, Wikipedia has more about the film, and so does IMDB.
Theater of Blood was just one of a succession of revenge comedies – many starring Price – that appeared in the 1970s. Along with Theater of Blood, my favorites are The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) and Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1972), along with the less well-known Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (1978), starring George Segal.
Although these are all comedies, their lineage clearly traces back to the Jacobean revenge tragedies made popular by playwrights such as John Webster in the early 17th century. Of course, those are nowhere near as funny, and neither is the Morgan Freeman – Brad Pitt – Kevin Spacey serial-killer movie Se7en (1995), which takes the Seven Deadly Sins as its theme.
It’s a form I’ve toyed with more than once, but I have yet to write a whole adventure in this style. Never say never, though. Over the holidays I was reminded of an idea I had back in college, in which the ghost of Dr. Phibes (or the man himself – does a villain that good ever really die?) gives the world his take on the Twelve Days of Christmas. Who knows? Maybe one day.
Other Detlef Sierck Productions
Mostellaria (The Haunted House) by Titus Maccius Plautus
About Detlef Sierck
Detlef Sierck, the greatest dramatist of his day, was created by Kim Newman (under the pesudonym Jack Yeovil) for the Warhammer novel Drachenfels. He made guest appearances in Jack Yeovil’s Genevieve Undead and William King’s Skavenslayer, and has appeared in two products for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay: the Warhammer Companion for WFRP 1st edition and Rough Nights and Hard Days for WFRP 4th edition.
2024: The Year in Review
Image stolen from the Hallmark web site. No challenge intended to copyright holders.
So here we are, at the end of 2024. It’s the time that many people look back over the year, so I thought I would do the same. Ups and downs, to be sure, but some bright spots and a couple of things that I’m really proud of. Here they are, in no particular order.
MythWalker
In 2022, I was hired by NantGames to help with the worldbuilding and narrative design for a mobile geolocation rpg. Think Pokémon GO meets World of Warcraft: as you walk around the real world, you use your device to view the fantasy world of Mytherra, where your Hero takes on monsters and follows quests from multiple unfolding storylines. Along the way you can level up, craft and upgrade gear, and do everything else you’d expect from an MMORPG.
What sealed the deal for me was the plan to base the fantasy world of Mytherra very heavily on Earth’s own myths and legends. If you have followed my career over recent years, you’ll know that the creatures of mythology and folklore are a lifelong interest of mine. The game has much more to recommend it, of course, and the team is, I can safely say, the best I have worked with in my entire career. The fun, light-hearted tone of the game is also a nice change from the grimdark fantasy of Warhammer and other titles from my past.
MythWalkerTM is available now for iOS and Android. For more information, go to MythWalker.com, look up @MythWakerGame on social media, or check out the game’s Discord server at https://discord.gg/xXFNp5YfkF.
Solasta II and the Solasta 5e Sourcebook
In 2018-2022, I helped Paris-based Tactical Adventures develop the setting and storyline for their “true to the tabletop” 5e-based crpg Solasta: Crown of the Magister. The game did well, winning a French award and spawning several years’ worth of downloadable content.
Along the way, we put together a 5e tabletop sourcebook for the setting. Initially available only as a Kickstarter reward, it was recently reissued in an expanded form which includes all of the DLC and is now generally available: in physical form from Modiphius Entertainment, and digitally from DriveThruRPG.
But that’s not all. Solasta II was recently announced, and although I won’t be able to work on it, I’m immensely proud that the game and setting turned out well enough to merit a sequel. It will be available for PC on Steam early in 2025.
Solasta has a thriving online community including a Facebook page, a Discord server, and all the usual social media platforms. I posted last month about my role in building the world.
The Monster of the Month Club
Earlier this month, I launched a Patreon campaign to support a publishing venture of my own. I’d spent more than a decade tinkering with a system-agnostic format for ttrpg monster descriptions, and thanks to a valiant band of playtesters and beta readers, I was able to pull the trigger at last.
The Monster of the Month Club offers members a new creature from world myth and folklore each and every month, in a detailed, 4-8-page treatment that includes baseline stats for 3d6/d20 and d100-based systems, as well as common comparables (e.g. Strength: as ox; Intelligence: as normal human; etc.) to help GMs derived stats for their system of choice quickly and easily. Detailed notes on basic and optional abilities support customization to taste and permit the creation of elite versions. Adventure seeds are provided for fantasy, historical, and modern settings, and are supported by case studies from literature where available. Also provided on an as-available basis are notes on variants from across the world: for example, December’s Monster of the Month treatment, the Irish/Scots/Manx Leannán Sídhe, includes notes on the Lamia and the Empusa of Classical myth, as well as the Baobhan Sith and Galistig of Scottish folklore.
Paid memberships start at US$1/month, and free memberships are also available. There are free samples available to download, so you can try before you buy, and from time to time I post other material relating to monsters and folklore. In December, for example, these posts included an article on converting stats between rpg systems that I wrote in the 1980s, some thoughts on creating monster-centric adventures, and even a review of a recent movie that had an unexpected (and impressive) folklore element.
The Monster of the Month Club Patreon page is at https://www.patreon.com/MonsteroftheMonthClub. There is also a Discord server (https://discord.gg/J3dbnav5YJ) which will be getting a serious overhaul some time soon, and a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61566896375147. On other social media, look for @MotMClub.
Solemn Vale and Summer of Strange
Some adventures I wrote for this pair of indie horror games from Dirty Vortex saw print this year. Solemn Vale takes its inspiration from British folk horror of the 1960s and ’70s (think the original version of The Wicker Man rather than the Nic Cage remake), while Summer of Strange looks to American supernatural horror from the ’80s. They are powered by Dirty Vortex’s house system, the Wyrd Abacus, which is refreshingly rules-lite and uses an adventure format that is both easy to understand and easy to write for.
The books are available direct from Dirty Vortex, while PDFs can be found on DriveThruRPG: Solemn Vale Core Book, Tales from the Wyrd, Summer of Strange.
…And also, this Blog
I’ve been trying to post more regularly over the past few months, and readers seem to appreciate that.
By far the most popular post this year was the one on Space Nuns and Dongnoids, a very silly memory from the GW Design Studio during the early development of the game that would become Warhammer 40,000. I don’t often post about 40K because I was only peripherally involved in its early development, but the response to this little tale has prompted me to trawl through my memory for anything else that might be of interest.
Next most popular was this post with my memories of Castle Drachenfels, Flame’s last publication for WFRP 1st edition. If you don’t think killer dungeons are compatible with WFRP’s style and ethos, this one will change your mind.
Almost as silly as Space Nuns and Dongnoids was the story of how the Knights Panther got their name, based on a very weak pun in The Enemy Within and a few details in this painting by John Blanche. That was the third most popular post this year, making it very clear that what readers find my memories of GW in the 80s compelling. I’ll see what else I can trawl up in 2025.
Also of interest to a lot of people has been the series – still in progress – presenting some unpublished material for Advanced Heroquest that I wrote all the way back in 1991 and recently rediscovered on an old disk. It was my original submission for the Undead supplement that was published as Terror in the Dark, and a great deal of what I wrote was not included in the final publication. The first instalment is here, and each one includes links both forward and backward.
Compliments of the season to all, congratulations on surviving 2024, and all the very best for 2025!
Advanced Heroquest: The Quest Machine, Part 1
Last week I promised you the monster tables to go with my previous AHQ posts (Fiction, New Hazards, Undead Monsters, Dark Wizards, and Other New Monsters). Turns out I was lying. You see, I realized that they wouldn’t make any sense without the quest generation system that I wrote for Advanced Heroquest Undead Supplement. In the final form of Terror in the Dark, this was replaced by Carl Sargent’s multi-part “Quest for the Lichemaster,” but here it is how.
This week, the base system and the first two location types. In the next few weeks, I’ll post the remaining locations. Then the monster tables will make sense. I hope. Anyway, let me know what you think in the comments.
The Quest Machine
The rules and tables in this section will allow you to create an almost endless variety of quests for your Advanced Heroquest games. Each quest will have its own story, its own villain and its own rewards at the end – and no two will even be alike!
You should generate the details of the quest immediately before starting play. Be sure to keep notes, as certain details of the quest will affect things later on in the game. By the time the Heroes are ready to set out, they will know exactly where they are going and what they have to do.
THE PLACE
There are all sorts of places where a band of Heroes might encounter undead creatures. Your first job is to find out where the quest will take place, and what the place is like. Roll on the Place Table.
The Place Table
Roll a D12 to determine whether the place is good, neutral or evil. The roll again to discover what type of place it is.
For example: Your first roll is a 3 – indicating that the place is good. Your second roll is a 7, so you refer to the Good column of the table and find out that it is a Monastery Catacomb.
The following sections give you further information on each place, and tell you what to do next.
ROYAL TOMBS
In the distant past, the area now occupied by the Empire was home to several great tribes of farmers and hunters. One of these was the Unberognens – it was from this tribe that Sigmar himself sprang. Centuries ago, according to scholars, the great royal house of the Unberogens buried their dead in a vast complex of rock-cut tombs beneath the Grey Mountains. The dead kings lie still beneath the peaks, and their treasure is said to be considerable. Adventurers still whisper of Borla’s Crown, the Sword of Valduric, and the Dragon Shield of Forris the Strong. They whisper, too, of the deadly traps and magical guardians that protect them. Now, according to rumour, a prospector in the Grey Mountains has found the lost entrance to the Unberogen tombs.
Quests
Roll once on the following table to discover why the Heroes are going into the royal tombs:
D12 Quest
1-3 Find Borla’s Crown
4-5 Find the Sword of Valduric
6-7 Replace the Dragon Shield
8-10 Ghoul Hunt
11-12 Cleanse the Shrine of Osric
Find Borla’s Crown
Players’ Information
Civil war is imminent. Several renegade nobles are secretly gathering armies to depose the Emperor. They are led by Duke Albrecht, who claims descent from the ancient Unberogen king Borla. If you can find the Crown and get it to the Emperor, civil war may be averted. If it falls into the hands of the rebels, an uprising is sure to follow. The Emperor himself has ordered this quest, and you have been chosen. As loyal citizens, you do not refuse. If you succeed, you will be given 100 gold crowns each. You may keep anything you find in the tombs except Borla’s Crown – but you may not loot any tombs. Duke Albrecht has already sent his own followers out to find the Crown, so time is of the essence!
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Opposition table
If referred to a Followers table: Opposition table
Heroes who search any sarcophagus lose a Fate Point each time they do so – a just punishment for their sacrilege!
The first two Quest rooms the Heroes encounter will be stairs down; the third will be Borla’s tomb. The Tomb is a small room with one door; the sarcophagus is in the centre. The Crown is resting on the sarcophagus.
To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find Borla’s Tomb and at least one of them must leave the complex with the Crown. They may not keep the Crown after the Quest.
Find the Sword of Valduric
Players’ Information
The great Hero Valduric destroyed the terrible Bloodthirster Ravax Gorespite seven centuries ago. Valduric was so badly wounded that he died shortly after the battle, and in honour of his service the Emperor decreed that he should be buried in the royal tombs, along with his sword. Now, a Chaos Sorcerer has succeeded in summoning Gorespite back from the void, and only the Sword of Valduric can save the day. You must find Valduric’s tomb, retrieve the Sword, and bring it back so that the Bloodthirster can be destroyed once more.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
If referred to a Followers table: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
If a Bloodthirster is generated, it is Gorespite himself, come to stop the Heroes finding the sword! Generate the tomb complex in the normal way, except that Quest rooms will always be stairs down.
Each time the Heroes find a sarcophagus, you should roll a D12 – a roll of 12 or more means that they have found the tomb of Valduric. Add 1 for each sarcophagus they have already discovered, and 1 for each Fate Point they spend to increase their chances. Players must decide to spend Fate Points before the dice is rolled. The sarcophagus contains only the sword and the bones of Valduric.
There are two ways to complete the Quest, once the Heroes have found the sword: one or more of them may take it out of the complex, or they may encounter Gorespite and kill him. The Sword of Valduric is a magical weapon – it can hit Invulnerable monsters just as if they weren’t Invulnerable, and it does double damage against Bloodthirsters. The Heroes may not keep the sword after the Quest.
Replace the Dragon Shield
Players’ Information
The famous Dragon Shield of Forris the Strong has been stolen from the royal tombs! The tomb-robbers were caught, and are now in jail awaiting their punishment. Meanwhile, you are to take the Dragon Shield back to the royal tombs and replace it in Forris’ tomb where it belongs. You may not loot any tombs while on this Quest.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Unoccupied Complex table
If referred to a Followers table: re-roll
The first two Quest rooms will be stairs down. The third will be Forris’ tomb. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find Forris’ tomb and leave the Dragon Shield there. They may use the shield on the way – it is magical, giving its wielder Toughness +2 without reducing Speed. Bow Skill is reduced by -1, though, and a Hero may not use a two-handed sword, axe or halberd while carrying the shield.
Any Hero who searches a sarcophagus during the course of this Quest must spend a Fate Point or pay a 100 GC fine at the end of the Quest.
Ghoul Hunt
Players’ Information
The royal tombs have become infested by a nest of Ghouls! You must drive them out so that the eternal peace of the dead kings can be restored. Go into the tombs, kill every Ghoul you find, and discover their lair. You can claim a bounty of 10 GCs for each Ghoul you slay while on this Quest.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Ghoul table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Ghoul table
If referred to a Followers table: Ghoul table
The first and second Quest rooms encountered will both be stairs down to a deeper level; the third will be the Ghouls’ lair, containing a Ghoul Chieftain and a number of Ghouls indicated by one roll on the Ghoul table. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find and slay the Ghoul Chieftain.
Cleanse the Shrine of Osric
Players’ Information
The royal tombs have been broken into by followers of Chaos, and the great Shrine of Osric has been desecrated! You must wipe out the evil followers of Chaos, find the shrine, and cleanse it of their desecration by sprinkling holy water all over the room.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
If referred to a Followers table: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
The first and second Quest rooms encountered will both be stairs down to a deeper level; the third will be the shrine the Heroes seek. Lesser shrines (ie those generated by the Hazard table) have been left intact. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find the shrine, and spend one exploration turn sprinkling it with holy water – if they have no holy water by the time they arrive, their Quest fails.
MONUMENT
Near the Tsar’s palace in the city of Kislev stands the Hill of Heroes, a great monument to the thousands who fell defending the land against the hordes of Chaos two hundred years ago. Thousands of warriors from all over the Old World rest in the tunnels beneath the Hill of Heroes, for it was not far from here that the final battle was fought and the tide of Chaos was turned back from engulfing the whole world.
Quests
Roll once on the following table to discover why the Heroes are going into the Hill of Heroes:
D12 Quest
1-3 The Banner of the Bear
4-5 The Army of Death
6-7 Chaos Returns
8-10 Ghoul Hunt
11-12 The Vampire
The Banner of the Bear
Players’ Information
The Ranger-Knights of the Brotherhood of the Bear fought valiantly against Chaos, and they are still one of the elite units of the army of Kislev. Their first banner, said to have been blessed by Taal the Lord of the Wilds, is buried beneath the Hill of Heroes along with Kralyevitch Ivan, the greatest of the Brotherhood to fall in the Chaos Wars. A new chapel is being built for the Brotherhood in the Tsar’s palace itself, and it has been decreed that the Banner of the Bear should hang here in memory of their great deeds. Your Quest is to explore the Hill of Heroes, find the Banner of the Bear, and bring it back. You may not loot any tombs during this Quest.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Unoccupied Complex table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Unoccupied Complex table
If referred to a Followers table: re-roll
Each time the Heroes discover a Quest room, roll a D12: on a roll of 1-9 it is a set of stairs down, on a roll of 10 or more it is the tomb of Kralyevitch Ivan. This is a small room containing a sarcophagus and the banner.
To complete the Quest, the Heroes must reach the tomb, and one or more of them must leave the complex carrying the banner. The Banner of the Bear is magical, and a Hero who is carrying the banner counts as Fearsome to animals (such as rats) and to creatures and followers of Chaos. A Hero who is carrying the banner may not cast spells or use a bow, two- handed weapon or halberd – one hand must always be free to hold the banner.
A Hero who searches a sarcophagus during this Quest loses a Fate Point each time he does so. The Heroes may not keep the Banner of the Bear after the Quest.
The Army of Death
Players’ Information
The Necromancer Vlad Bathek has broken into the Hill of Heroes, and is preparing to raise a vast undead army to overthrow the Tsar! You must find the evil Necromancer and thwart his plans – but hurry, for his power grows with each passing hour!
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Undead Wandering Monsters table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Necromancer Followers table
If referred to a Followers table: Necromancer Followers table
Take a Necromancer Character Monster Counter to represent Vlad Bathek. Each time the Heroes encounter a Quest room, roll a D12. On a roll of 1-9 it is actually a Hazard room, and the GM may take one Dungeon Counter – time is getting shorter, and Bathek’s undead minions are growing more numerous! On a roll of 10-12, the Heroes have found Bathek’s lair – he is here (unless he has previously been encountered and killed) with one roll of minions from the Necromancer Followers table.
To complete the Quest, the Heroes must meet and kill Vlad Bathek.
Chaos Returns
Players’ Information
The minions of Chaos have infiltrated the Hill of Heroes, and are preparing to conduct a ghastly ritual in the monument to their defeat. Even now, they are hiding in the tunnels, raising the dead to serve their foul cause and summoning creatures of Chaos to help them in their work. You must find the place where they are conducting their obscene rituals and wipe them out.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
If referred to a Followers table: Chaos Sorcerer Followers table
Each time the Heroes encounter a Quest room, roll a D12. On a roll of 1-9 it is actually a set of stairs down, and the GM may draw a Dungeon Counter – the cultists are becoming more powerful! On a roll of 10-12, the Heroes have found the ritual room. It is a large room containing a Chaos Sorcerer and additional monsters generated by a roll on the Chaos Sorcerer Followers table. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find the ritual room and slay everything in it.
Ghoul Hunt
Players’ Information
The Hill of Heroes has become infested by a nest of Ghouls! You must drive them out so that the eternal peace of the dead heroes can be restored. Go into the tombs, kill every Ghoul you find, and discover their lair. You can claim a bounty of 10 GCs for each Ghoul you slay while on this Quest.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table
Wandering Monsters: Ghoul table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Ghoul table
If referred to a Followers table: Ghoul table
The first and second Quest rooms encountered will both be stairs down to a deeper level; the third will be their lair, containing a Ghoul Chieftain and a number of Ghouls indicated by one roll on the Ghoul table. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find and slay the Ghoul Chieftain.
The Vampire
Players’ Information
The infamous Vampire Radu Vrolyetsin has made his lair in the Hill of Heroes – he must be found and destroyed. You must make your way through the tombs until you find the part of the complex where he has made his home, and then you must cleanse that area thoroughly, finding his lair and destroying him.
GM’s Information
Lair Occupants: Disturbed Complex table until second Quest room found; thereafter Vampire Lord Followers table
Wandering Monsters: Disturbed Complex table until second Quest room found; thereafter Vampire Lord Followers table
Wandering Monster Dungeon Counters: Vampire Lord Followers table
If referred to a Followers table: Vampire Lord Followers table
Take a Vampire Lord Character Monster Counter to represent Radu Vrolyetsin. Also, take one Escape Dungeon Counter before play starts – you may only use this with Radu Vrolyetsin.
The first and second Quest rooms encountered will both be stairs down. The third Quest room is the Vampire’s lair, containing the sarcophagus where he sleeps. If Vrolyetsin has not already been destroyed he will be here; he may not Escape from a combat in this room, as he must defend his sarcophagus. To complete the Quest, the Heroes must find and destroy the Vampire Lord.
All Posts in this Series
The Quest Machine, Part 1: Royal Tombs and Monument
The Quest Machine, Part 2: Monastery Catacombs and Sanctuary of Morr
The Quest Machine, Part 3: Cemetery and Place of Legend
The Quest Machine, Part 4: Underground Battlefield and Dwarfhold Tomb Complex
The Quest Machine, Part 5: Necromancer’s Lair and Evil City
The Quest Machine, Part 6: Overrun Necropolis and Vampire’s Stronghold
The Lichemaster and Me
The excellent Jordan Sorcery has posted one short and one full-length video about the history of Heinrich Kemmler, who might be the longest-serving Warhammer villain.
Jordan focuses on Kemmler’s first outing, in the 1986 battle pack Terror of the Lichemaster for Warhammer’s second edition. But that was just the start of his career. Here’s what I remember of the rest.
Terror and Vengeance
I began to look into Warhammer seriously during the winter of 1985-6, when I first committed to freelancing as a game writer. Some more memories of that time can be found in this post from 2012. I got the 2nd edition rules, Blood Bath at Orc’s Drift, and Terror of the Lichemaster, and played them on the floor of my flat, taking both sides as I tried to get inside the Warhammer rules and figure out how to write for the game.
I began to absorb the Old World setting, which was no more than a few lines here and there in rulebooks and miniatures ads, but it’s fair to say that Heinrich Kemmler was the first “name” character I encountered in that setting. I submitted a proposal for a battle pack of my own, which I talk about in this guest post on Gideon’s Awesome Lies blog, but times were changing and it came to nothing.
Well, maybe not quite nothing, because shortly afterward I was invited down to Nottingham for a series of meetings that ended up with an offer to come on board and help develop the game that became Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay – and we all know where that led (or if you don’t, take a look here, and also here).
Anyway, I arrived at Games Workshop just after the Third Citadel Journal had been published. It focused on the Skaven, which had only just been introduced to the Warhammer setting, but it also presented a sequel to Terror of the Lichemaster – including, as the issue’s theme demanded, a guest appearance by the Skaven.
Now, I had no hand in any of this, but it was clear already that Kemmler was a character to watch. He seemed to be indestructible (after all, you can never trust a necromancer to stay dead), meaning that he could pop up anywhere, at any time, when a writer needed to deploy a serious villain.
Having being a fan of the undead ever since I saw Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts at the age of about six, I dreamed of using him in an adventure some day. The prospect seemed far off, though, as WFRP’s grim and gritty tone, coupled with the low power of the early Enemy Within campaign adventures, didn’t offer the opportunity to use such an epic foe – especially if he brought his undead army with him. However, I didn’t have to wait too long for what came next.
Gideon at the Awesome Lies blog has also posted on the battle pack – see his post here.
Lichemaster
Games Workshop established Flame Publications in 1989, as a wholly-owned subsidiary devoted to supporting Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay – and also, I suspect, to get Mike Brunton, Tony Ackland, and me safely out of the main Design Studio so our irreverent attitude toward the company’s growing middle management corps would not be able to infect the rest of the workforce. Shortly before, Aly and Trish Morrison had been sent out to create Marauder Miniatures, possibly for a similar reason. In fact, Flame was situated one floor below Marauder, in a house on Derby Road whose bottom two floors were sub-let from the law firm on the top. Heaven knows what their clients thought of us!
Be that as it may, Flame was required to produce one 80+page, print-ready book for WFRP every two months, as well as 8 print-ready pages for White Dwarf every month. Everything was commissioned from freelancers: my job was to edit and develop the text; Tony created art for anything that couldn’t be supplied from the copious Games Workshop art archive; and Mike did layout on an Apple Mac – possibly the first time GW experimented with desktop publishing – and pasted the artwork into the pages. Cartography was outsourced to Ian Cooke, a former GW deputy art director who had gone freelance.
Economy was the name of the game. After the miniatures deals in the first few Enemy Within adventures had failed to generate significant sales, Bryan Ansell had decided that WFRP, and paper products in general, could not be made profitable. Tom Kirby – ex-TSR and then the Studio manager – pleaded for roleplaying games to be given one last chance, and this was it. That is why so much art in Flame products (including Empire in Flames, which was Flame’s first project despite its GW branding) was re-used from elsewhere, and why almost all of the writing was re-used as well. Lichemaster is a perfect example of this approach.
Carl Sargent was given copies of Terror and Vengeance and told to turn them into a WFRP adventure of around 96 pages, plus supporting material. I don’t remember exactly, but I believe he turned it around in 2-3 weeks, which may be an indication of how little he was paid. The manuscript that arrived was titled Swathe of Undeath, which I changed to Return of the Lichemaster. However, GW management decreed that the cover should read simply Lichemaster, and it’s been known by that title ever since.
The adventure was, as ordered, a straightforward roleplaying adaptation of the battle pack and its sequel, but I changed a few things in the course of development. For one thing, I wanted to set this adventure after the events of the Warhammer campaign, so that Kemmler was coming back once again after having been defeated at La Maisontaal. I wrote some introductory fiction and changed a few details so that my intended timeline worked, and so that the adventure wasn’t too obviously the same thing over again.
Lichemaster was the first product I developed at Flame. I moved on to the four Doomstones adventures, which had been re-statted for WFRP by another freelancer, Brad Freeman, and then to more work from Carl and others. The last (for WFRP, at least) was Castle Drachenfels, which I discussed in a recent post.
Terror in the Dark
I posted recently about this supplement for Advanced Heroquest, which I wrote in 1991. The published version – which differs significantly from the manuscript I submitted – included a campaign written by Carl Sargent and titled, rather unimaginatively, “The Quest for the Lichemaster.” Since AHQ shared the Warhammer setting, this made sense in an undead-themed supplement, and it allowed Terror in the Dark – another Flame production – to get one more use out of some of the art Tony had created for the Lichemaster adventure.
Once again, the Unsinkable Mr. Kemmler has come back from being defeated by a band of heroes in the past – and once again, I didn’t get to write an adventure around him. Ah, well.
Update! Actually, I did get to write adventures with the Lichemaster – I’d just forgotten because they were never published – until now. He features in the quest generator I wrote for the supplement – and here it is!
4th to 8th Editions: The Army Books
When I left Games Workshop in 1990, I expected that would be the last time I encountered Heinrich Kemmler. Hogshead Publishing licensed WFRP from GW, but Lichemaster was not among the titles that James Wallis decided to reprint – which was fair enough, as the reviews had been lackluster at best.
WFRP 2nd edition came and went, and so did 3rd, with no mention of him – but he lived on in the army books for Warhammer 4th through 8th editions, even surviving the change of branding from Undead to Vampire Counts. With each new army book, his legend grew – but his page on the Warhammer Wiki tells that story better than I can.
Most recently, Kemmler made his way into video games in Total War: Warhammer. Ironically, I had worked on a couple of previous Total War titles, as well as on Warhammer, but not this one. Once again, he had managed to evade me. It was starting to feel personal.
WFRP 4 and The Enemy Within Director’s Cut
Although I never managed to write anything of my own about Heinrich Kemmler, I was able to pay a kind of tribute to him at long last. In the companion volumes to the last four instalments of the Enemy Within Director’s Cut for WFRP 4th edition, I created a junior necromancer who became obsessed with the Lichemaster and longed to emulate his prowess, even going so far as to style himself the Gravelord. It’s all very tongue in cheek and not everyone will appreciate the humor, but it may be as close as I get to being able to say “The Lichemaster and Me.”
Except in the title of this post, of course.
Announcing MythWalker™
I have an exciting announcement. In July of last year, after 14 years as a freelancer, I took a full-time job. It is an exceptional job, with an exceptional team, helping to develop a new fantasy gaming IP. Funny to think that’s how my career started, being hired by Games Workshop to organize and develop the Warhammer Fantasy IP and co-create Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. But I digress.
Just a few days ago, the game was announced and the studio moved out of semi-stealth mode. MythWalker™, the first title from NantGames, is a mobile geolocation RPG featuring the parallel world of Mytherra, which players can explore through their phones by moving around on Earth. It is now in closed Beta, but there is much, much more to come.
Here are some links for more information. Be sure to check out the trailers – yes, I’m in them, but on the other hand they were partly shot on the same soundstage as The Mandalorian and other hit shows.
Announcement Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovkhkou8T8o
Extended Announcement Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcIaKIB578c
Sign up for Beta: https://MythWalker.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MythWalkerGame
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mythwalkergame
Graeme Davis 
