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Posted

Here is where I expound on various subjects the players may never have known, or were never able to find out as I didn’t tell them.

Topic 2

Written on April 1, 2007.

A wizard sits high up in a tower, scrying to see what he can see. He then learns that he is just a fictional character. Made up by the crew of the Starship Wanderer, what ever that might be. A ship full of people, traveling between the stars. He isn’t real.

There is a flash of light, and he lives no more.

On that starship, a crew member puts down a pencil, after removing the NPC wizard he had created. This isn’t 3rd Edition, but 1st Edition…


Topic 1

Written and posted on April 1, 2002.

I’ll start off by saying something I never let onto while we were gaming.

I had told them Crestar was not a parallel Earth. What I didn’t tell them was the world their characters were on, was completely artificial. I had read Philip Jose Farmer’s story ‘World of Tiers’. But I decided to never tell the players, or let them find maps, etc. as the main characters in the stories that made the World of Tiers would have turned my game into a Killer Dungeon, and I don’t game that way. Why did I decide to use this ? I wanted my campaign to be different. I had encountered many DMs by that time who had made their campaign a parallel earth, similar to our Earth, but in a different dimension or universe. They even used slightly modified maps they got from various books.

I just didn’t want to copy something that all ready existed, I wanted a unique world.

True, Farmer’s stories gave me that idea, so that part originated with him, but me implementing it as a world in 1980 would be unique, at least as far as I know. Note that this was before any game based on ‘Tier of Worlds’ stories existed.

So, now you know. The deities in my campaign were computers and computer operators. All working for ‘The Sky God’, the being that had, millenia ago, built Crestar. An artificial universe. In someone’s pocket… No ! Not the DM’s pocket !

Or is it this way ? I could be just kidding… :-) Note the date above.




Author
Categories Crest of a Star, General

Posted

The community bakers get up early in the morning, around 3 AM. The night shift prepared the bread dough, pre-heated the ovens. The morning shift arrives and takes over. The nice smell of baking bread wafts across Fondfield. It wakes a few people up. It usually perks up the guards on night shift. Long time merchants waiting outside the gate knows this means Fondfield will soon be open for business.

Day shift guard serjeants wake up the day guards around 5 AM.

(How could they tell time accurately ? A Crestar version of the Antikythera mechanism, but it isn’t turned by hand. It tracks time as well as planet and star movement. The capitals of Trillolara and Dank Forest use large water clocks. Archimedes would easily understand the water clock mechanisms. I got the info on these items by watching History channel.)

Around 7 AM the Inns serve breakfast. Most day shift guards are on duty by then, and the gate has been opened.

After sunrise a team of lamp lighters goes around town and turns off the street lamps.

As the morning progresses, shifts change, farmer wagons sometimes show up with goods for the Inn or the castle.

Various sounds can be heard across town, the entertainers at the open air market, anvils and metal being worked. Watch changes. The smells of bread being baked. The sounds from the potter and the smell of pottery being fired. Although the sounds of watch changes don’t always match the watch actually changing. A security measure.

Baking at the community bake shop goes on all day.

At various times fighter exercises can be heard at the fighter school.

A bit of magic can occasionally be seen at the magic school.

Sometimes a bit of speech is heard from the spellcasters… ‘oh, that is going to leave a mark’.

Usually preceeded by a small ‘ka-whump’ sound.

A few hours after dawn, adventurers can be seen leaving the Inn and heading for various merchants’ stores. Typically repairs of weapons and armor, buying supplies, and getting gems and jewelry evaluated.

If it is market day, some head over there to check on what items are for sale. While they don’t typically toss money around, they have been known to help those in need in Fondfield.

(to be continued)


Author
Categories South Hemisphere

Posted

Most night shifts are quiet, unless someone starts something at one of the taverns. Generally speaking the adventurers don’t cause a free for all, and they don’t like it when someone does. They spend days or weeks out beyond on little sleep, and they prefer quiet when they get back into town. The town guard arrives at the Green Goose Inn, they typically find a group of smiling adventurers. Some of them are only partially dressed. But the burglar or pickpocket is typically in much pain and tied up. The burglar or pickpocket is hauled off to prison.

The gates are always opened just after dawn. How do they do it ? There is a small protected slot in one gate. A small white pole is placed in a iron-socketed hole behind the gate. When the white pole is illuminated by false dawn the gate crew starts opening it. On cloudy days the Serjeant of the Guard decides when the gate opening process starts.

Sometimes the gate crew don’t want to get up. The new ones anyway. They don’t get supper dessert for 3 days if they are late for gate opening. Gresha makes wonderful desserts.

Before the gate crew arrives for duty, the gate and the opening mechanism are inspected by the night shift Serjeant of the Watch and the night engineer. Yeah, night engineer. Somebody has to be up if one of the ballistas fails. And sometimes the night shift might mumble about one of the balistas or something else that is acting quirky that never gets into the shift report.

The gate bell tolls 3 times. The gate crew starts to work the gate mechanism.

Several locks are undone, a magic-user removes the magic locks. Gears are engaged.

Once the opening is large enough, the herald and 5 guards go out and make the announcement about costs to enter.

The gate continues to creak open.

Any wounded adventurers go in first. Then their wagons and other gear. Well, they have to have something to bring treasure back with, or the bodies of their compatriots.

Scribes, guards, and a few servants check the arrivals. The tax collector notes which adventurers made a good haul, and who needs medical help. Allowances are made if they need medical help, sometimes an unscrupulous group will pretend injury. In that case, their taxes are doubled.

Clerics have been checking for evil, from up on the wall. Yes, detecting evil and checking alignment. Such checks have saved the town more than once.

The sun is barely clearing the eastern horizon. A few small birds head for the open market. A family of squirrels, that live in the few trees near the market, look for Khanta the merchant. They steer clear of his market stall, evidently they have learned he likes cooked squirrel.

A few small clouds float by over head.

Shala, the morning star, slowly dims as the sun rises.

Sometimes both moons are in the sky.

The sky gets brighter.

The door opening mechanism continues to move.

Extra guards await nearby, in case an evil group tries to rush the gate. Which has happened in the past. Their backup are druids, magic-users, illusionists, and clerics. Along with a squad of 20 longbowmen.

The sun is now above the horizon.

The gate is opened. The gate opener crew relaxes, some pick up weapons in case they are needed.

Next are a few select merchants, then the rest.

Some food sellers have already setup in the open air market.

Adventurers are being tended to at the Green Goose Inn.

A group of scribes and servants show the merchants where to setup their stalls. A nicely drawn, accurate, map of each stall location is clearly marked on a map of the market map. Alongside of each stall location is drawn where the merchant’s wagon can be parked. The map is only of the open air market, so the town guard isn’t too worried about thieves using it to move around town and steal. Some people in Fondfield have worried about evil teleporting in, using the map as a guide, but the those in the know don’t seem too worried about it.

There are refreshment and snack food vendors that work just on market day. Merchants get a small discount from them.

Most days the open market is full. After mid-summer festival the merchants and town folks are usually too tired to go to the open air market.

Mid-summer festival ? I’ll talk about it some other time. Three days… it deserves its own story.

Around mid-day, sometimes later, a few adventurers arrive at the open air market. Usually they are looking for items not available in town. They have also been known to expose merchants with badly made armor and weapons.

After the merchant wagons go in, one side of the gate is closed. Makes it easier to quickly close the gates if that becomes necessary.

Sometimes it was a good idea, sometimes not.

Most days the area around the West gate are quiet once the adventurers and merchants go into town.

Occasionally a messenger or a troop of cavalry will cause a bit of a stir.

From time to time the messenger will have a call for help. These requests are handled by the Serjeant and Captain of the Guard. Why not the Leutenant of the Guard ? That officer of the guard deals with town guard rotations, alerts, and defending the town. The Captain has the authority to send a group out to help, and the serjeant has the knowledge to determine who to send. More than once they had had to decide to not send help as it looked like the town was being depleted of enough guards to make it easy for an enemy to take the town.

In such instances, adventurers defend the east side of town, and the Captain and Serjeant decide if those city guards can be sent somewhere. Sadly, there are times the outlying garrisons don’t get any help. But that doesn’t happen often.

(to be continued)


Author
Categories South Hemisphere

Posted

Gug died over 100 years ago.

The store is now owned by Cathy Lorn

limited quantities of items:

quantity item cost:

2 atl-atl 45 gp 5 awl, leather working 3 sp 5 axe, battle 6 gp 9 axe, hand 2 gp 30 boots, adventure 5 gp 60 boots, town 8 sp 6 backpack, canvas 9 gp 15 backpack, leather 2 gp 15 bag, large, cloth, 3 cubic feet 15 cp 30 bag, small, cloth, 1 cubic foot 8 cp 30 bandages, 2” x 5 yards 3 cp 45 banded, 3” x 7 yards 7 cp 15 banded armor 78 gp ( human, elf, half-elf, dwarf, halfling, gnome) 3 bardiche 8 gp 9 barding, cloth 50 gp 2 barding, leather 100 gp 12 basket, small, tight weave, 1’ x 2’ deep 4 sp 5 basket,small, tight weave, 1’ x 2’ deep, with lid 5 sp 3 cp


Author
Categories South Hemisphere

Posted

Zips linked below. The maps are 2000 pixels across. I shrank them by 50% so they will load on this page faster.

Column 7

43. water, a boulder with moss

44. blue fairy circle, leafless bushes, yellow dirt path, medium green bushes

45. dark yellow path, rock piles, leafless and leafy bushes

46. dark yellow path, yellow path, 2 tree stumps, 2 wall pieces, a small pumpkin patch, red and green medium bushes, 3 pumpkin patches

47. 2 paths, 4 trimmed tree trunks, 2 open pits, 3 rubble piles, small bushes of various colors, pit with a metal grate

48. small ruined temple, 2 skeletons, 3 dirt pathsvarious medium bushes

49. dirt path with small rocks on it, various color bushes

7 maps, jpg, 5’ grid 4 megabytes, 7 maps. | 7 maps, jpg, no grid 3.8 megabytes, 7 maps.

7 maps, png, 5’ grid 316 megabytes, 7 maps. | 7 maps, png, no grid 29.5 megabytes, 7 maps.

Examples of some of the maps in these zip files.





Author
Categories Game Aids, 75' x 50' vtt maps


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