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Showing posts from July, 2024

OSR and priests of nature

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Imagine 'wandering monster' tables, not just for monsters. Resources you'd find in bogs: (1) wild beans, (2) a flower, (3) crawfish, (4) a healing herb, (5) a mineral, (6)  marsh hen. Gets you thinking about druids, identifying plants and animals. *** Norman - in OSE - says druids are 'priests of nature.' E.K. Johnston's novel, The Druid's Call recounts a younger druid, her early hardship, found family, and miraculous powers. Doric, a 5e, Tiefling druid.  It's an almost-young-adult novel . I love it especially when Doric comes across an owlbear! The owlbear stood at least ten feet high...Its face was more pointed than that of a regular bear. It didn't have teeth, but its hooked beak was the size of its head. Its talon's were at least five inches long, curling towards razor-sharp points... In shock, Doric still sees the owlbear is wounded, protecting the cave it lives in. Attuned to 'the force of nature itself', Doric thought, The owlbe

OSR, Conan, Shaky Cat, and Cadfael

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Maybe, like Stevenson, you're 'known and pointed out for the pattern of an idler.' You'll turn to comics, a solo adventure, and the imagined cool of a 12th Century abbey. You'll already know the flittings that follow! *** A Conan the Barbarian comic  [from a drawing by Richard Pace in The Savage Sword of Conan, Vol. 2 ] All's not well with Conan's world in Zub and Pace's comic, Leaving the Garden . He's been buried alive. And in frame on frame of slashing, black & white drawings, Conan is 'leaving the garden' - he's digging out from the grave. In the world above, only Conan could survive. Leaving the Garden almost rips its pages. Demon-infestations. Innocence ruined. Conan's grief, and his slaughtering axe. But it's still a comic, still beautiful, and brimming with brutal hack 'n slash action. ***  A solo DnD Adventure   [from the cover illustration by Carlos Castilho in The Meadery Mishap ] In my solo game, I've pla