Chim-Noamski the Talking Monkey; God of the Many Bowls

Chim-Noamski is the talking monkey god of language and civilization. Often depicted as a monkey with a bowl; he is the ultimate arbiter of the rise, fall, and direction of a civilization. His temples are covered in decorative chimpanzees with live ones everywhere. The temples are filled with nick nacks, whatever the monkeys decide to bring in. Much of the priest's time is spent cleaning up the offal created by so many animals. When they are not cleaning they are usually debating the merits of the latest divination from Chim, or acting as arbitrators in assorted disputes. Evil priests of Chim have been known to operate investment schemes which are ussually based on a false prophecy of future wealth of the community. These are known as Kanzi Schemes.

In each temple there is a large jewel eyed (typically blue jewels of value based on wealth of the community) monkey statue with a bowl. When the monkeys put something in the bowl it is interpreted as (and at times actually may be) a divination about the community (roll on divination chart). Sometimes minor prophecies concerning individuals are uttered by a random chimp in a temple (1% chance for each individual on each visit).

The Avatar of Chim (when he appears) is a blue eyed talking chimpanzee who is carrying a bowl. His bowl always contains many items. The items found in the bowl correspond to the cards in a deck of many things but the effects apply to the whole settlement where the temple is located.

Should the avatar be treated well, then he may choose to give the blessing of Chim to the settlement. Chim's blessing allows everyone who enters the settlement to be understood no matter what language they are speaking. Should the avatar be treated poorly, he may choose to give the settlement the curse of Chim. Chim's curse makes it impossible for anyone in the settlement to understand spoken language, even their own.

Knocking or breaking the bowl off the idol will incite the rage of Chim and the murderous anger of 10d6 chimpanzees and 1d6 priests of Chim.

Random Divinations of Chim-Noamski:

The divinations must be interpreted based on what was in the bowl. Before rolling on this chart the DM should create a d12 chart of random objects that the chimpanzees have collected in their temple that could turn up in the bowl, leaving the 12 blank. When a twelve is rolled on this chart it is a legitimate prophecy. The DM then should roll again to determine the item in the bowl.

The DM should then roll twice on the following chart. The first is the real meaning of the prophecy, the second is the priest's interpretation of the prophecy.


1> There will be a plague of _________ in the settlement.
2> The settlement will be destroyed by _________ in ____ days.
3> An enemy will come to destroy the settlement unless __________ is done.
4> There will be a lack of _________ in the settlement.
5> The settlement is out of the favor of Chim and must atone by ___________
6> The settlement is cursed to slowly die off and be forgotten forever.
7> The settlement is blessed and will rise to be center of an empire.
8> The settlement is in the favor of Chim and must move forward with all plans involving ________ .
9> There will be plenty of _________ in the settlement.
10> The settlement must attack all enemy settlements that have ________ and spare no one.
11> The settlement is protected from _______ for another d100 years.
12> Health and long life will come to the settlement in the form of _________.

New Series: ODD Gods

ODD Gods is a series of regular posts where I post a god that fits the old school style of OD&D but is also a little odd. I have retroactively changed the Raziel of the Sack post to reflect this.

The Ecology of the Megadungeon

We have heard the names before: Castle Greyhawk, Undermountain, Night Below, Moria, Rappan Athuk, Castle Whiterock, The World's Largest Dungeon. The megadungeons. These are the engines that powered countless the Old School campaigns. Recently they have been called the tentpoles of the old school campaign and with good reason. But where is that crossing point between dungeon and megadungeon? Is it like that old definition of pornography- I know it when I see it?

Accross the old school blogs we have seen a lot of talk about megadungeons and even seen examples of new megadungeons appear. But what defines a megadungeon? Is it based on design principles? Capacity for character advancement? Is it a publishing threshold like a page or word count?

Melan on Dragonsfoot has stated that a megadungeon is "A dungeon expansive enough to accommodate an entire campaign of substantial length." At first glance this seems a throwaway definition. However as you unpack it, we begin to see that a dungeon fitting this definition must include a lot. Most dungeons do not survive to a second visit by the party. And most recorded megadungeons were not visitied multiple times by one party but multiple times by multiple parties. The key words here are ENTIRE, SUBSTANTIAL, LENGTH. The megadungeon must be multi faceted and different from part to part to keep a whole campaign going. This need to keep it interesting dictates that the "gaming terrain" of the megadungeon vary, sometimes wildly.

In this respect the megadungeon can have several functions. It is obviously the principle adventure location for a campaign. But it can also serve as an interface to the whole of the DM's creation. Portals and other means of transport allow a megadungeon to act as a sort of subway to other adventure locations. We see this with the demiplanes of Castle Greyhawk, and the portals undoutedly found in Undermountain. This allows the entirity of the campaign to tie back to the megadungeon. Not just in that the megadungeon is location 0 but rather that all of the gaming world is concievibly accessible through it.

While a campaign is a series of linked sessions and can be very short, the megadungeon in a DMs world can provide a constant and help it to persist from party to party and gaming group to gaming group. In this respect a megadungeon would probably have to be planar in nature and essentially limitless. I believe this is why Castle Greyhawk only came close to seeing the light of day as a summation of the spirit of the original. The original was too expansive. This reveals a seldom realised corollary to Melan's definition: The extent of a megadungeon is a function of the number of players, parties, groups and characters that have visited it. That is it grows by use. The megadungeon is a megadungeon only if the campaign is extensive enough to warrant its continued and constant growth.

Certainly you can create a megadungeon whole and complete as Athena from the get go. We have seen it done in a lot of products. But in the true megadungeon development is always just several steps ahead of the players, and those places that have been visited can be visited again. But curiously if you carry this out to its logical conclusion you realise that the megadungeon is really just the sandcastle at the center of the sandbox as that really is what a megadungeon is: The sandbox concept applied to the dungeon rather than the world.

This is an Awesome Post

No not this post. THIS POST, by the great Sham, is awesome. First it shows somthing he is doing. Second it illustrates a principle of game design. Third you get a great how to that you can easily replicate yourself and last it calls attention to awesomeness that is not his own. I am posting about it here because it needs more links to it so more people can go and relish in its awesomeness. And if you want even more awesome awesomeness read his thoughts on OD&D books I-III (too many to link to). You will never look at the monsters, treasures, heros (and antiheros) the same way again.

1d20 Dreams for the Dying and Unconscious

This table has taken a while to write. I have been coming up with the ideas sort of piecemeal on my lunch breaks over the past couple of months. The idea is that in a fight, when death is near and a character goes unconscious they might have a weird dream before they die or are revived. These are written in such a way that the DM can run with the idea and use it to describe to the player the character's movement towards or away from death rather than giving him a number.

Say if the player rolls a 1, and dreams of chains, the DM can describe the chains doing things that reflect the status of the character's current condition. It could be that they are the chains holding the soul to the body, or that they are a measure of how dead you are. Either way the DM can describe what is happening to the chains as the character improves or declines.

1) chains
2) dark forms
3) whispers
4) crawler in a pit
5) dancing cows
6) giant whirlpool
7) falling
8) drowning
9) fat man eating
10) spider web
11) giant black dog
12) tentacles
13) wings
14) maddening gibberish
15) body on fire
16) talking monkeys/apes
17) body freezing
18) thin man walking
19) fog
20) belching frog

More about my 4e Character

Overall I like 4e. It is a fun game and allows for the options I want in a way. It has a lot of what I look for in a system but my only problem with it is that it is largely driven by component. It's like the dev team is a buch of guys in a box trying to dream up new rule legos.

Many have said it feels like a video game. I agree in spirit, but I disagree about the video game it feels like. Many think this:















I think this:










Movement is a big part of 4e, almost in the same way that it is a big part of Dragonslair. And that was what inspired me to base my first character on Dirk the Daring as I stated here.

But something weird happened as I played him. He looks like this guy:















But given the history and the mercenary attitude I gave him he feels and acts more like this guy:



















So I have decided to roll with it and combine them. After all, cool + cool = 2cool right? I think the following picture best represents my 4e character:














Dirk is turning out to be one dangerous dude.

Currently Dreaming the Dream of the Black Lotus

I have not posted for a while as I am away with other things. I still have a slew of ideas to share and as my black lotus dream continues I gain more. But I have been working a bit here and there on Codex which has a new name, and hashing out some fiction that as life would have it right now may never see the light of day.

Since I have entered my dream state, many things have passed in this world. Many of them political. Since such petty politics are below those of us who plumb the dreamlands for deeper mysteries in our lotus inspired sleep you will not see my opinion on this blog nor in your comments with a name that links to this blog. Though I may clearly agree or greatly disagree my opinion (on many things) is my own and I will not share. Also, in the end, politics is bad for business.

Nor will you hear about my personal life. Again me complaining about how my life sucked today or yesterday or how I think something is neat is not good for business. You will only get madness and dreams particular to fiction and gaming.

Till I post again with further madness...