Intergalactic Bastionland - The Light

As you might have guessed, a lot of my attention is on GRIMLITE right now, but I do still let my mind drift back to Intergalactic Bastionland from time to time. It's still bubbling away, but it's still very much in the stage where it's trying to find its identity before I go into doing some proper testing. 

So this is how the game feels in my head right now, but be prepared for that to change.

Intergalactic Bastionland is all about travelling. It's likely your start or endpoint will be in the Light. These are the places that lie fully within the glow of a Living Star. There's a sense of safety at first, but depending on the Star in question, it might not last for long.

Key Principles of the Light

• Everything is alive.
• It welcomes travellers that follow the rules.
• Those that serve the Star have variable interpretations of the rules.

The Star's Agenda

People that have spent time in Bastion often refer to the city having a personality of its own. Writers call it a character in their story, and people that the city has chewed up and spat out curse its cruel nature.

All of which are valid, but really it's just bricks and mortar and pigeons and a whole lot of people that are out for themselves.

The Stars, though. They are alive. Their personality and agenda goes beyond the words of poets and can be felt and seen everywhere under their light.

Sure, they're inconsistent and inhuman, but there's no question that the light of a star carries its agenda. The difficult part is working out which part of their agenda is currently being enforced. They're always more layered than they first appear.

At the furthest reaches of the light the influence is subtle. Places might feel familiar, with a slight tone of their star's philosophical hue. The closer you drift, the more you explore, the more extreme the influence becomes.

Haze - the Star of Grey Mists - wants to provide a place safe from prying eyes. Secrets are obscured by swirling clouds, conspiracies are given a safe haven. In time, visitors begin to forget even their own appearance. Here we must all gradually lose our identity in the mist. Everything is grey. Only then are we free to act on our truest desires. 

Cherat - the Sunrise Star - is a place of new beginnings. Yes, it's always sunrise, wherever you stand under Rau's light. Don't question that, but embrace the optimism. The future is coming, and we can be a part of it. The problem with an eternal sunrise is that hope turns to impatience. What comes next is always just another beginning. Anything caught in the present must make way for the future. Perhaps you've already been here too long.

Roah - the Howling Star - catharsis requires a place where you do not need to understand your message as long as it's loud. If you do it right, others can't help but join in, building to a furious crescendo. Fantastic for binding together a group of angry individuals as a pack, headed out into the void to enact their vengeance on the rest of existence. 

Enforcing the Rules

The light itself can only push visitors in the right direction. Each individual location within a Star's glow needs rules to hold it together. The nature of this enforcement can lead to the original message of the star getting warped beyond recognition, but Stars embrace this as just another aspect of their domain.

Loyal residents may enforce their own view of a Star's agenda individually or in organised groups. Some stars reward this with gifts, others simply observe. Most Stars also have their own ways of ensuring things run to their liking: Beings born out of light, visions of the star's belief. Some even talk of stars bending their light into a physical form and walking among their visitors. 

Veil Warden of Haze

8hp. Concealed Sword (d10 on turn revealed, d6 afterward). 

• When two secrets begin to become intertwined, groups try to encroach on each other's space in the mist, or somebody seeks to retain too much of their own identity, the Wardens form a blockade.
• When the Warden takes Critical Damage, the attacker's allies must all make a CHA Save. If any of them fail, the character with highest individual roll cannot be found. As the veil falls from the dying Warden's face it is revealed to be that character, now dying. The Warden is nowhere to be seen.
• Suffers d12 damage if their veil is forcibly removed.

Horizon Herald of Cherat 

7hp.

• Looms on the horizon, a reminder that all must make way for the coming day. Those that see them are compelled to move away. 
• Those that move towards them are granted a vision of the future, then lashed with a stroke of dawn-light (d10). 
• If they are killed, the sunrise begins to swell violently. All in its light suffer d6 damage each turn until they can get into the shadow, but worse things dwell there.

Howling Embodiment of Roah

STR 18, 14hp. Roaring Maw (d10 Blast), Flame Form (Ignore damage from non-extinguishing sources).

• Roar even louder than everybody else. Those who join in recover all HP and Ability Scores, those who do not suffer d6 damage per Round until they join in or flee the light.
• Beckon followers into the flames, where they suffer d6 damage at first, then no further harm. 
• Blast off into the Stars, safely carrying all those that dwell within their flames. The target of this vengeance is normally somebody that a visitor has been shouting about loudly for long enough.

Pervasive Shadow

Stars can only avoid shadow if they remain solitary, empty orbits made inhospitable by any means at the star's disposal. Even then there always reaches a point where darkness begins to mingle with its light. This darkness simultaneously seeks to undermine the work of the star, but can't help but be shaped by its philosophy. 

So most Stars accept the Dark as another tool at their disposal, allowing it to dwell on the fringes of their light, clinging to every object in the Star's domain, waiting for an opportunity to intrude into the world of light. Sometimes a Star might allow this intrusion to happen with careful distribution of its illumination. Every heaven needs a hell, and sometimes the hounds need to be unleashed. 

Unveiler of Haze

DEX 16, 10hp. Ripping Claws (4d6), Shadow form (Armour 3 vs material attacks).

• Can smell secrets, drawn to them like a starving animal.
• On Critical Damage, tear a secret from the mind of the victim, then vanish into the shadows to decide how to use this against them.
• Always willing to cut a deal that involves learning more secrets.

Long Shadow of Cherat

CHA 17, 10hp. Shadow form (Armour 3 vs material attacks). Claw (d6). 

• Drawn to those that have outstayed their welcome. 
• Beckons victims to come to them. If they refuse, they lose d10 CHA. If they accept they are pulled into the Dark, where the Long Shadow tends to them well. They will only release a prisoner if they are assured they are going to carry out vengeance on Cherat itself.
• Anyone looking at the Shadow feels tired. Each Turn they must pass a CHA Save or be reduced to 0hp and Deprived until they rest.

Futiliser of Roah

STR 5, DEX 5, CHA 5, 3hp.  Shadow form (Armour 3 vs material attacks). 

• Not hostile at all, but calmly explains why what you're doing is futile, and that you should give up. If you agree and leave the light of Roah, restore all HP and Ability Scores. If you refuse, the Futiliser will just follow you. 
• When one is banished back to the shadows another is never far behind. 
• If you agree to quit, but go back on your word, they summon something much worse from the Dark.

Framing Weirdness

Bastionland has a lot of weird stuff. The closest thing to an introductory adventure has, among other things:

• Dirt and worm worshipping teenagers
• A hedgehog judge with other animals as servants
• Slugs piloting mechanical bodies
• A lonely whalebone mech

That's quite a lot of strangeness to throw at your players in game one, not even factoring in that the characters themselves might be a bunch of pretty weird individuals.

Some groups will lap this up, it can help some groups to consider how they present the weird elements. Remember that, at large, Bastionland is deliberately designed to be somewhat more mundane than a typical fantasy setting.

That is to say that for most residents of Bastionland, life doesn't look all that different to life today. Most people live in the city, they have a job they applied for, they buy food from the shops, they listen to their music collection and indulge in hobbies with their friends at the weekend.

This might seem like I'm stating the obvious, but in a more medieval-style world none of the above would be taken for granted by an average person. 

So I wanted to present a few tools for framing the weirder elements of your Bastionland if you're finding it a touch too much to take neat.

Dilution Reveals Flavour

Going hard on the whisky analogy here. Fancy drinkers will tell you to put a few drops of water into your whisky, even more if it's cask strength, which lets the flavour open up. Think of weirdness like your alcohol content here. It's got a lot of flavour, but too much and you only get the burn, or in this case weirdness-overload. 

Yes, you can make your entire Borough head to tail bonkers, but it might be tough to stomach. Sometimes reining it back in is the right way to go. 

I'm aware of the hypocrisy here, as I'm normally more of a "Go big! Subtlety is overrated" sort of GM, but it's really about reading your group. I'd still advise things like big, impactful consequences for actions, and strongly defined, memorable characters, but for your setting as a whole it's sometimes nice to have...

A Solid Foundation

Cities are already weird and confusing. Don't be afraid to just let Bastion be a city. Yeah, you can turn it up to 11, but it's a familiar song. 

If your campaign centres around an alien world where gravity is tidal and everybody is telepathic then you're on uncertain ground from day one. Rely on Bastionland's solid foundation of something that the players can relate to. Even if you don't want to go for the city route, Deep Country should hold elements that are familiar to anybody that's spent time in rural areas.

For this reason I wouldn't really advise a game set entirely in the Underground. For me it works as a new level of weirdness that you descend into, before returning to that solid foundation in Bastion or Deep Country. 

Weird Empathy

Incomprehensible alien intelligence can make for appealing antagonists, but I like to make even the weirdest characters relatable. Give them a good, strong drive or emotion that we can all sympathise with. To use the example of ABYSS in the Prison of the Worm Queen, he's lonely. The actions he takes are hopefully different to how we would react to loneliness, but the core is the same.

I don't go into too much detail in the actual document, but when I've run the game I do everything I can to make the players feel that loneliness. It might feel strange, like this is the "boss monster" right? If you make the players empathise too much won't they just refuse to fight it? Well, yeah. That happens quite often, and in my eyes it can lead to much more interesting situations than a fight.

Cloak of Mundanity

A common trick with modern-weird and alternate-history settings. Keep the surface level of everything relatively normal. Push the Mockeries and Aliens far into the background. Leave the machines in the Underground. Bastion is big and messy, but mostly has familiar elements.

It's definitely not how I'd run the game, especially for one-shots, but if you're still getting to grips with your idea of Bastionland, and your players are perhaps less exposed to weird fiction and fantasy it can be a good way to ease them into a longer campaign where they gradually discover the strange elements of the setting one by one. 

A Setting to Serve the Game

At some point I suspect we've all sat down to read an RPG and gone through the following process:

• This setting looks neat, I'd love to run a game in it.
• Okay, there's quite a lot of setting here, time to dig deeper.
• Right, that's all cool, but I have no idea how I'd actually run a game in there.

This is something I try to avoid whenever I'm working on a setting for a game. I've spoken about it before as the idea that Setting should Serve the Game.

Basically, the game is more important than the setting, so if something needs to change it should be the setting. This isn't some universal dogma, just how I like things to be with games I'm playing. I believe that the world comes to life at the game table, not on the GMs desk.

So from the very start Into the Odd did this. The game existed before the setting, so I knew that I needed a world where:

• Adventurers could go out and look for treasure as independent groups.
• Weird obstacles could guard the treasure.
• Some treasure would have weird powers.

With Into the Odd we got a world with a single city that's barely held under any sort of authority, a perilous underground that doesn't follow the rules and a wilderness that doesn't make sense, and the implication that Arcana are discarded alien devices. A world born out of the game's adventurous requirements.

Electric Bastionland expanded on this with the Debtholders, Failed Careers and Machines all being new elements that both flavour the setting but were ultimately born from game requirements.

As with all my advice, this all sounds very absolute. Am I saying that your game setting should have NOTHING that doesn't directly relate to the game? Well sure, if it works, but I don't begrudge people that like a bit of side-salad on their plate. If it gets the reader inspired then it's good by me, but too much side-salad and I suddenly realise I can't see the pasta anymore.

This is particularly relevant as I hash out a loose setting for GRIMLITE, a world I'm tentatively naming Husk28, a forgotten moon of a broken planet. Tinkering around with it got me thinking about one of the most successful tabletop RPG settings of all time.

WARHAMMER 40,000

Something about this setting just works. It got its flesh-hooks into me when I was 10 years old and despite walking away multiple times something keeps dragging me back. Sure, miniatures are appealing, and there's some incredible artwork that brings the setting to life, but I think it's worth dissecting the setting to see why it works. Does it support my theory that the best settings serve the game, or does it cry Heresy at my false sermon?

This is cheating a bit, as this is clearly a setting primarily written for miniature wargaming, rather than RPGs, but the same principles apply. Many jokes have been made about the tagline "In the Grim Darkness of the Far Future there is Only War" but it really spotlights that this is a world that exists for the benefit of your table. 

I'll take any excuse to talk about the two original Realms of Chaos books. These were giant, messy volumes filled with Chaos stuff. The core of it really was a procedure for creating a Champion in the service of one of the four Chaos Gods. You'd also get some random followers ranging from humble Skaven and Orcs to Sorcerers, Manticores, and Giant Snails. It definitely had that early-GW feel of "let's make a game where we can use all our weird miniatures at once", yet the setting makes it work. You aren't just a grab-bag of unrelated miniatures, you're a warped and disparate warband following a twisted god of corruption. Why is your Knightly Champion being followed by a Giang Frog and a Minotaur? Chaos! That's why!

Of course the random element sort of spits in the face of this idea. If I roll a Treeman as my latest follower I guess I'd better go and buy the miniature or get creative with some twigs. I suspect many players would fudge the randomness slightly to make their own miniatures fit here, but the kitbasher in me sort of likes the challenge of going full-random.

So the Realms of Chaos work as a setting for narrative wargames. There's a reason for your warband to exist the way it does, and there's a reason why you're always fighting everybody all the time on bizarre battlefields. I'm cheating here, because while these books do serve 40k they feel primarily written with an eye on Warhammer Fantasy Battles.

Warhammer 40k has Chaos, sure, but amongst other elements it also has the Imperium. This is both its biggest asset and flaw.

Chaos works because you've got four factions with a very strong identity and clear reasons to oppose each other, but plenty of room for variety within them. A Khorne warband made up of Dark Elves and elite Chaos Warriors is going to feel very different to one made up of a horde of Beastmen and Snotlings. Yeah, you can get Khornate Snotlings in Realms of Chaos. 

At first the Imperium looks like it has all the same hallmarks. It's big and incomprehensible. It's fractured into the Mechanicus, Militarum, Inquisition, Arbites, Astartes and the faux-latin list could go on all day. Even these fractures have sub-fractures, most classically in Space Marine Chapters that breaks the Astartes down into handily colour-coded factions each with their own gimmick and agenda.

But it's not quite the same. At a glance you'd think this perfectly serves a game where you need to be able to explain any two players fighting a pitched battle against each other. 

Ultramarines vs Tyranids? Great. Rematch of the century. 

Ultramarines vs Mechanicus? Sure, I guess. Their agendas could clash in a way that sparks a battle.

Ultramarines vs Imperial Fists? Erm. I guess one of these Chapters is sheltering an enemy of the Imperium? Maybe Tzeentch has tricked one of us into attacking the other. No, not my side, your side.

Ultramarines vs Ultramarines? Suppose one of us has to be the Alpha Legion in disguise? Wait, we both have Roboute Guilliman soooo....

It gets worse with some of the other factions. Eldar are an ancient, dying race where every life is precious. So why are they mowing themselves down again?

I mean it's not going to stop two players fighting each other, but it lessens the narrative appeal. You can make it work if you're creative, but it doesn't have that masterful directness of Realms of Chaos. Anything goes over there, so two followers of Slaanesh could easily be pitched against each other just as easily as they'd go and raid the civilised lands. 

I wrote WARPHAMMER 99k as a joke, but it sort of demonstrates a very clumsy approach to making the 40k setting better serve the game. It catapults the 40k universe back into the Realms of Chaos, but it  loses a lot in the process. Personally I feel like it's an issue of scale. 40k wants to be this epic thing. Wars of millions are fought every day above hive planet with billions of people, all but a speck compared to the trillions of Daemons that pour into the galaxy from the Eye of Terror, yet all this is nothing compared to...

And so on.

But the fact is, most people are going to engage with the setting through battles between armies measured in dozens rather than even hundreds, maybe even less than that if they're playing Kill Team. Sure, the individual life is meaningless in this cruel galaxy, but I also spent hours painting this little Exarch and I think she's actually pretty cool. 

So I like that the Imperium is unfathomably massive and stagnant, but what's lost if we apply a thunder hammer to it until the cracks are a bit clearer.

Completely fracture the Astartes. At least enough that it's easy to explain why your Salamanders are fighting my Blood Angels every week.

This is a lot easier if you remove the idea that the marines are the heroes of the story. There's an entire rant on that topic stashed away inside me but I'll bury it down for another day.

Put more narrative focus on the individuals. Allow everybody to be a bit of a renegade. Allegiance is primarily to your army's leader, rather than the faction as a whole. Now there's more appeal in considering why two Wolf Lords would bring their Companies to war against each other. 

What's that? There's already an edition of Warhammer 40k that solves all of these issues?

Rogue Trader was weird. Sort of the 40k parallel to the Realms of Chaos books. Giant mess of creative ideas, blurring the line between wargame and RPG, with heavy focus on "let's use every weird mini we have". 

And the Rogue Traders themselves are essentially the Renegades I was describing above. They fly around deep space seeking money by whatever means. They have Imperial authority but can also basically do what they want. Hire an Eldar bodyguard? Sure. Get some Ork crew? Great. Blow up a rival Rogue Trader? Absolutely.

Most meaningfully, it's easy to imagine two rival Rogue Traders calling on support from different Marine chapters. Now that Salamanders vs Blood Angels battle is on.

Modern 40k is clearly having to walk a line between serving its tabletop games alongside a range of novels, video-games, and presumably the big-budget TV series and movies are only a matter of time away. 

If you're writing a setting to be used purely at the table then you've got the luxury of focus. Take a step back and look at the actual needs of your game. You'll thank me when you sit down with a bunch of new players and your world emerges through play rather than an exposition dump.

Mash-Up Character Method

People worry a lot about worldbuilding and creating an evocative setting for their games. Locations are great, but in my experience a setting is best delivered through its Characters.

Its a philosophy I've taken to the extreme in Electric Bastionland, where a large amount of setting is delivered through the Failed Careers section that makes up two-thirds of the book. Understanding these people is the way to understand the world that they live in, and it doesn't exist without them.

So I wanted to talk in a longer form about how I create characters for my own games, and how they generate the tone of my own games.

Start with what you know.

First, I create a short list (let's do three of each for this example) of concepts that I could use for characters. These aren't interesting on their own, but we're going to combine them to make something that's easy to conceptualise but has a little depth.

I'll start with the most obvious, which is that of played-out character archetypes like you've seen used a thousand times before.

1. Thief with a heart of gold
2. Wise woman of the village
3. Used-car salesman

These ideas are easy to run with, but they aren't interesting on their own, so let's do two more. Another easy one is animals. It's easy to project animal characteristics onto a person, imagining the equivalent human behaviour.

1. Snake
2. Terrier
3. Thoroughbred Horse

Your lists might look different, but you're looking for any concepts that can be projected onto a person. You might be able to imagine the personality of a certain type of car, genre of music, or a typeface if those are your areas of expertise. You can dive into straight-up character traits if you wish (cowardice, anxiety, envy) and I find the negative traits work well here. Better still if you dare to draw on your own negative traits. 

If you want a real challenge just grab completely random nouns, but that's very much hard-mode for this.

Mash them Up

Now we combine our lists to get:

1. Snakelike thief with a heart of gold
2. Terrier wise-woman
3. Thoroughbred used-car salesman

This, but backwards.

The ideal here is that you get two ideas that juxtapose each other. I'd argue that the snake-like thief is a bit too redundant, as we're probably already imagining the thief to have some of the same characteristics as the snake. Similarly I think the sort of preening behaviour I'd expert from a thoroughbred horse are redundant with the overly confident used-car salesman cliche. Let's mix them around a bit.

1. Thoroughbred thief with a heart of gold
2. Snakelike wise-woman
3. Terrier used-car salesman

I'm happier with these combinations as they move the initial archetype away from its cliche. You've got a thief that might have a heart of gold, but perhaps their vanity and showmanship creates some conflict. The wise-woman isn't going to be the helpful, maternal figure I was expecting, and instead can be cold and downright threatening with her snakelike elements. Finally the used-car salesman can be sleazy like we'd expect, but also persistent, excitable, and even a bit adorable.

Describing the Look

I don't like descriptions like this.

They're around 5"9 with hazel eyes and medium-brown hair worn in a rough bun. Their overalls are typical of an engineer, and they carry a selection of tools on their belt. They have a confident gait with...

Yeah you've lost me. Just give me two things.

Give me the overview of their appearance in two or three words. I do the same with locations. If I describe an "abandoned warehouse" then your imagination can fill the gaps as well as any description I give of dusty crates and faded paint. Not everybody will imagine the exact same picture, but it gives you a foundation.

Obviously at the table you've got room to expand on this description, but I'd save that for if you need it. Certainly for your notes you should be able to summarise it to two or three words.

Most importantly, draw on the two elements you used for this character for this description.

1. Slender, handsome man. (thoroughbred/thief)
2. Oily old woman. (snake/wise-woman)
3. Scruffy little man (terrier/salesman)

But wait! I don't even know what colour this scruffy little man's hair is?

Wait and see if anybody asks. You've already pictured somebody in your head, and your players are quite capable of doing the same.

Now just as I liked having a juxtaposition in the elements, point out one element of their appearance that stands out against the broad strokes you just painted.

1. Slender, handsome man wearing scruffy patched-up clothes. (thoroughbred/thief)
2. Oily, elderly woman with a mechanical arm. (snake/wise-woman)
3. Scruffy little man wearing gold-rimmed glasses (terrier/salesman)

What would cause you to notice them in a crowd?

The Voice

Voices become difficult if you overthink them. Maybe you have a range of flawless dialects and voice-actor-worthy performances, but I tend to stick to more earthy limits and go into any character's voice with the goals that it be:

• Easy for me to maintain and repeat
• Easy for the players to recognise as a particular character

So with that in mind I stick pretty close to the original elements, but make sure they're both being represented. Even if you don't nail what you were going for the key is that you can easily repeat it. 

1. Slender, handsome man. (thoroughbred/thief) - Here I'd mash up the high-society aspirations from the thoroughbred with the fact that this man is clearly just a lowly thief. Think of the most down-to-earth person you know and imagine how they'd sound trying to fit in at a fancy day-at-the-races.
2. Oily elderly woman. (snake/wise-woman) - Sssslow with a predatory precision, but keep that old-lady warmth and overly familiar side. Lean hard into the "oh I could just eat you up" side of the grandmother stereotype for something veering between creepy and comforting.
3. Scruffy little man (terrier/salesman) - Fast and excitable of course! Yappy even! They're so glad you're here and maybe their attention span isn't great so hey, come and look at this. But throw in all the lingo you'd expect from somebody trying to bombard you with car specifications.

Remember to include physical behaviours as part of their voice. Our thoroughbred is always trying to stand taller and prouder. Our snake is licking her lips and almost gliding across the room. Our terrier is bounding from one thing to the next and snarling at bigger rivals like he's trying to prove something.

Their Place in the World

This is how we tie them into the world. You might be creating these characters for specific gaps in the game you're planning. Maybe you need somebody to serve the characters at the shop they just wandered into.

This is where things get really interesting! You might think that our thief is obviously a professional burglar in Bastion. Our wise-woman clearly occupies some hut out in Deep Country dishing out potions. Our used-car salesman is trying to convince a tram company to upgrade to a new model on behalf of his bosses.

Yeah, this works, but why not put them into the gaps you already have? Gaps you wouldn't expect to see them in?

Our thoroughbred-thief might be working in the dive-bar the characters just went into.
Our snake-woman might be a professor at the university.
Our salesman might actually be the mayor of a borough, surrounded by people he can boss around.

Think about how they can bring their existing personality to a role you wouldn't expect to see them in. You'll be surprised how readily the players accept characters that might initially seem like a bad fit for their role in the world. It even makes both the person and place more memorable.

Their Goal

Now you know the character, and you know their current situation, think about how they would want it to change. Nobody is ever completely happy, after all. Consider all the ways that they are an ill-fit for the role you put them in, or ways in which their initial potential appears to be unfulfilled. Lean into those and give them each one really clear goal that they want to achieve. This doesn't have to be some grand scheme, in fact the basest desires often work best of all.

1. Slender, handsome dive-bar waiter (thoroughbred/thief). Wants to work at a much finer establishment.
2. Oily, elderly biology professor (snake/wise-woman). Wants to taste all sorts of taboo meats.
3. Scruffy little mayor (terrier/salesman). Wants to embarrass the mayor of a neighbouring district that he feels talks down to him. 

Finally, I give them a silly memorable name (just one name) that nods to their original concepts. It might feel on-the-nose but remember the goal here is to make something memorable. 

1. Derby the dive-bar waiter
2. Professor Piver
3. Mayor Ratter

As with other methods I use, it might take you a little while the first time, but it's easy enough to do on the fly if you just think of a few core elements ahead of time. 

Beneath Time and Space (Using the Underground)

It has become increasingly apparent that the network of sewers, vaults, prisons, and transit tunnels beneath our great Bastion reaches further than we thought in every direction. Indeed, the subterranean distances and directions, and the time spent travelling them, appear to behave independently of the surface. 

An hour along the same raging river could put you in the middle of the city, or weeks into Deep Country, depending on a single turn. A week-long slog through twisting caves might bring you out just a few streets away from your origin, mere seconds after you left. 

Quite where the boundaries lie between our own sub-architecture, that of our ancestors, the natural geological caves, and the imaginary horrors of the traumatised is open for much debate.

Of great interest are the rumoured connections to the Far Lands. While ships sail for months to reach those distant shores, those-in-the-know can crawl there in a few hours. It is supposed that this method could also be used by bizarre entities in the other direction. 

The prevailing danger and complication of these routes makes them appealing only to the impatient or terminally thrill-seeking. The more useful an Underground passage is, the more deathtraps and diversions exist along its way. Many obstacles are so specific and sadistic that they must be serving as amusement for some unseen observer.



As we know, any person or creature that makes its home in the Underground is certain to be twisted beyond redemption. . 

Using the Underground

If you've designed a dungeon, you've designed part of the Underground. But it needs a few special considerations to place it in the Odd World. Consider the Key Principles of the Underground

1. It connects everything.
2. It's slightly outside reality.
3. Everything is a challenge. 

And let's use them to better fit an existing dungeon into the Underground. Designing the dungeon was the hard part, so now we just need to check each of the key principles are represented.

1. Connect Everything
I'm assuming that the dungeon entrance is in Bastion, so this bit of the city should feel connected to the dungeon. The Long Stair is actually found at the top of a crumbling old tower, with its own logistical problems when it comes to access. Upon heading down the long stair, from the tiny top-floor, it's clear that you're entering a space that shouldn't be there.
Now let's say that the chute in Room 8 now leads to the Far Land of Scrapheap. Perhaps this is where the Rusty Man emerged from.
I'd also have another exit off to the greater Underground, perhaps connecting to a part of Deep Country. Perfect opportunity to create a new location connected with the purpose of the Rusted Vault. An abandoned fort with clues of experiments on creating metal-soldiers.

2. Shift Slightly Away from Reality
There are plenty of weird things down here, so I think we're safe with this. As a rule of thumb, imagine a weirdness scale with Bastion at the less extreme end and the Far Lands at the other. The Underground sits somewhere in the middle. Think of the alien influence of the Far Lands twisting the human element and familiarity of Bastion.

3. Add Challenge
There are lots of nasty things down here to stop it being an easy ride, but the connection to Scrapheap in Room 8 now feels a little convenient. Let's say that it really leads to a rusted labyrinth where the Rusty Man keeps a few human prisoners. He's the only one that can let you in or out this way, but
somewhere in the maze there's a metal-being that will try to lure you to Scrap Heap as her prisoner.

Beyond Cosmic Waters (and Creating Far Lands)

Beyond the light of Bastion, the ocean itself becomes alien. Salty spray and queasy bobbing turn to black-mirror water, singing wind, and surging currents propelling you like a runaway train. All the while the distant stars grow into glaring suns, and the night sky a rainbow of cosmic light.



Seasoned travellers can glance at their surroundings and have no doubt as to how far they are from home. Those wanting to get to Bastion need only turn their backs to this light and sail back to normality. Others hold their nerve and head on to the Far Lands.

Snuff-nosed writers in Bastion's coffee houses decree that their city is "Chaos under a Veil of Order".

Those that see beyond the madness of the Far Lands see irrefutable signs of order and design. Every pillar of fire hides a core of ice. Alien cities house bizarre beings that all know their place and act as one. Great stone arches allow wind, light, and time to pass through in altered ways.

Underneath the veil of Chaos, these are deeply ordered lands.

Then comes the madness of asking who could put such things in order.



Creating a Far Land

Firstly remember the Key Principles of Far Lands:
1. They are enticing.
2. They follow their own rules.
3. Everything is part of a design. 

So in creating a Far Land to use in your game, they roughly translate to:
1. Make them want to go there.
2. Decide on a the rules of this place.
3. Give everything a purpose for being there, forget naturalism.



Now think about why this place isn't just some Deep Country backwater. If you want some inspiration then grab a couple of items from the list.

1. Defined by breaking a core law of physics (Gravity, Time, Light, Scale)
2. Defined by an exaggerated landscape (endless mountain, bottomless pit, orbiting bodies)
3. Defined by an Alien Culture. (barely-humanoid, aberrant, eerily human)
4. Defined by a classical/other element (fire, water, one of the silly para/quasi-elements)
5. Defined by an emotion (anger, sadness, fear, attachment)
6. Defined by a single powerful being (physical giant, godlike cloud, hive mind)
7. Defined by an abstract concept (industry, decadence, physical strength, piety, greed)
8. Defined by a specific purpose (factory, prison, nursery, trap, battlefield, landfill)

Now look beyond that. As with planar adventures in D&D, it's no fun to have the Plane of Water be literally endless water. There's a reason people think of the City of Brass straight away when discussing the Plane of Fire.

So let's run with that. Let's say this Far Land is dominated by a Water theme.

Because we'll need a way to distinguish this water-land from the ocean around it, let's use the "orbiting bodies" idea and make it into a floating sphere of water. Like a micro-waterworld floating in the sky. We'll call it Bauble for now.

How are the group going to get up there? Let them figure it out, but remember the laws of nature don't apply here. The seas underneath Bauble have mountain-like waves, so they could always try and ride one of those up there.



We need a Reason to Go There

Some players will just want to explore, but we need to put something on there that's going to draw them in. Let's say that, although it's a sphere of dark water, there's a blue light glowing from the core, and there's some sign of islands on the surface.

Now let's set the rules of this place. The sphere works like its own planet, but you can't break through the water no matter how hard you try. The islands are sort of a belt stretching around the globe, in fact they're more like a city.

A scary thing about the ocean is the sheer size of some of its inhabitants, so this equator-city is populated by towering eel-like humanoids. Now we need a way for them to further hammer home the concept of order, while somehow embodying our water element.

Let's tie them into the very existence of Bauble. They're one with the water, and have a sort of Hydrokinesis when they come together in pairs. Each pair is partly responsible for holding Bauble up above the rest of the ocean.



Why are they doing this? Something nasty held in the water, of course. So there's a sort of prison element too. Let's say the light shining from the middle of Bauble is some trapped super-being.

When it's time off from chanting to keep their world afloat, we want them to have some other alien-agendas. Let's say the pairs are working to a common goal, but have incredibly petty differences with each other. Some go so far that they're trying to sabotage the efforts of other pairs, risking their entire world just to make them look bad at their job.

So there we have Bauble.
- Floating globe of water, bound by a belt-like city around its equator.
- Dark water with a glowing blue light in the middle.
- Held aloft to keep a great evil from entering the greater ocean.
- Kept aloft by pairs of Colossal Hydrokinetic Eel-People.
- The pairs each support one part of the world, but try to sabotage each other over petty differences.

Back to the Golden Lands

Due to their very nature, the two regions of the Odd World that I've written least about are the Golden Lands and the Polar Ocean. 

They're the place you go when you want to get really far from civilisation. When you have a place so weird you can't just put it in the Underground, or out in the furthest part of Deep Country. This place needs an ocean between it and the relative normality of Bastion. 

It would be impossible not to draw a parallel to our own world. I've been guilty of simplifying it to being the New World of this setting. But just as Bastion isn't London or Paris, the Golden Lands aren't the Americas or Africa. The name certainly doesn't help with that association, and in the supplement it might get a new name. The previous name of the Far Lands almost feels more suitable as I explore ideas. 

If you want a desert or jungle, you can put that in Deep Country. Same if you want to go down the route of having distant human cultures. Deep Country is big and the people at the far ends don't know about Bastion any more than you know about them.  

The Golden Lands are less like going to another continent, and more like going to another world. Maybe a dash of the magic of planar exploration. 

While I've previously spoken about them separately, the principles of the Golden Lands and Polar Ocean were always the same. 

Distant place where you throw whatever crazy thing you like. 

So the Polar Ocean is just a piece of the bigger canvas. Yes, there's an ocean where you sale into mist until everything gets weird, but all of the Golden Lands have an element of that. 

As you may have noticed I've been writing about other worlds a fair bit lately, so I don't know why I hadn't thought that some of these might have a better home the Golden Lands. 

With that in mind, here are the revised key principles.  

Key Principles of the Golden Lands
1. They draw you in.
2. They feel like an alien design.
3. The laws of nature don't apply. 

If you entered the Odd World and arrived in Bastion you'd think it was a crazy metropolis.

If you then went out to Deep Country you'd look back on Bastion fondly and say "At least they were sort of modern!"

If you then went to the Golden Lands you'd look back on Deep Country fondly and say "At least that felt like a real place!"

d12 Rumoured Golden Lands

1: The Breathing Marshes

2: The Desert Under The Low Sun

 3: The Blasted Giants

 4: The Hell of Emerald Lights

 5: The Poisoned Walk

 6: Parasite's Landing

 7: The Sealed Cities

 8: Diamond Range

9: Pillar of Injustice

 10: Incineration

 11: White Hole

12: Dropped-Space

Middly-Wacking

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Middly-Wacking

A high-walled refuge of quaint village life and rampant rollocking right in the middle of Bastion. You might come here to hunt down somebody important, find someone valuable to rob, or take a risky shortcut.

d6 Points of Interest

1. The Wriggle is one of the narrowest, steepest roads in Bastion, and is the only real way up into the village other than climbing the walls. Strictly single-file.

2. The Green is always home to some event, usually a complex but brutal sport involving rollocking-sticks, and by night a fun-fair or mass beating. 

3. The Lashing Hole is a fighting pit surrounded by comfy chairs, where residents sip gin coolers and occasionally fight each other with rollocking-sticks (d6). 

4. Middle Preservationist Legion Hall gathers older residents to deal with the village's issues and pass down the knowledge of how to create Buzz Jars (releases a cherry-bug swarm that sting for d6), Rollocking-Sticks (d6), and Razor-Bunting (d8 if tangled). 

5.  The Bundletop houses marksmen (8hp, d8 scoped musket) pointed at the outskirts of town in case unwelcome sorts try to rush in. 

6. The Poorboxes are scattered around the village and are used to imprison any unwelcome sorts. After a night of torment from passing youths (poking, pissing, cramming full of feathers) they're thrown back over the wall. A night in a Poorbox causes d6 loss from each Ability Score. 

Roll d20 to see who you encounter, and what they're doing.

1-4: d6 Preservationist Legionnaires - STR 5, DEX 10, WIL 15, 6hp, Walking/Flogging Canes, Throat-Knife (d6), Buzz-Jars (releases a cherry-bug swarm that sting for d6) Tweed and Lace. Want to maintain the lifestyle of the village and oppose change in all forms. 

1: Repairing a smashed Mock Peacock and retrieving the coins form its belly for the Preservationist Fund.

2: Tending carefully to a Red-Bug hive high atop an old tree, wobbling on top of ladders. 

3: On the hunt for a group of Jolly Rollockers that have beaten up one of their members.

4: Lecturing a Self-Made-Gents on the importance of modesty in the village, as he rides along on his new Man-Wagon (5hp, Pulled by brain-dead simpletons dressed in horse-heads). 

5-8: d6 Self-Made-Gents- 7hp, Elaborate Pistol (d8), Rollocking-Stick (d6), High Hat, Long Beard, elaborate pocket-watch (worth d6g). Want to prove that they had it tough growing up, but now they have great wealth. Think the Sportingmen are idiot meatheads.

5: Staggering, singing, drunk, and calling out any Sportingmen that want to fight. 

6: Hurling bottles of sparkling wine as far as they can, in the interest of a hundred Guilder bet. 

7: Cramming a Coffee-Boy from the local cafe into a Poorbox. 

8: Throwing an Underground Weirdo back down a shaft, lecturing him on how he has to work his way to the top, just as they did, before arguing amongst themselves as to who had it worse. 

9-11: d12 Sportingmen - STR 15, DEX 15, WIL 10, 10hp, Rollocking Stick (d6), white uniforms, colourful caps. Want to enforce a highly flexible value of Fair-Play. Think the Self-Made-Gents are spineless bean counters. 

9: Carrying an beaten Self-Made-Gent through the streets, singing a victory song.

10: Practicing for their next match with some elaborate drill that involves lots of shouting and arse-smacking. 

11: Smashing the village apart in search of a lost ball that's still in play for some vitally important match.

12-14: d6 Jolly Floggers - 5hp. Rollocking Stick (d6), stubby ties and rolled-up sleeves. Want to appear tough, and annoy the Preservationists. 

12: Flogging an elderly Preservationist and pressing a canvas against her to take an imprint of her beaten face.

13: Laughing at one of their own members that's been crammed into a Poorbox. 

14: Doing a bad job of sneaking a tied-up Crocodile into the house of a Preservationist. 

15-16: d10 Mock-Peacocks - 4hp, metal-body (Armour 1), hardened beak (d6), can only whistle merry tunes and  Want to eat coins, and will attack anyone that doesn't either toss them one to eat. Easily scared off if anyone puts up a fight. 

15: Being chased away by a Self-Made-Gent, who's lecturing them on how he earned every penny.

16: One is coughing up coins uncontrollably. Any others nearby are frantically pecking them up. 

17: Performing a blindingly fast, dangerously sharp mating dance, after which a new Mock Peacock will appear from the fray. 

18-19 - The Offal-Day Fool - 10hp, Reckless Punches (d6), damned fast, bed-robes, seemingly unlimited supply of offal to throw. Wants to carry out the Offal-Day tradition of asking "Is it Offal Day?", to which any answer beside ignoring him provokes an offal-assault. 

18: Rubbing a pair of pig lungs in the face of an unconscious old drunk lying in the road, whispering some poem about Offal Day.

19: Whooping and singing as he's chased away by a pack of Jolly-Floggers. Occasionally flicks some small kidneys at them if they relent in their chase. 

20: The Middly Leadboy - STR 6, DEX 6, WIL 7, 4hp, ignore attacks weaker than a cannon, can sink into any flower-bed to appear in any other in the village. Sees everything, and wants to create division and chaos, whether through truth or lies. 

20: Slowly rising from a flower bed to tell you some nasty secrets about the village.