"Noen fortjener en god død."

The Chronicle has been closed.

Evolution: Appendix N

Continuing on the Evolution-project, this time I'll try to compile a list of reference literature. These books all have elements of what I see fitting in the new age of Argos. Again, this is mostly for my own benefit, as a way of gathering my thoughts, but I can recommend each of the titles listed below.

The Painted Man

The Dark Continent has many dark legends, and though those of the Witch-king of Gerem Faït are not amongst the more widely known, they have few rivals in terms of fear, horror, and undying evil.

In the days when the Erian civilizations were still young, there lived a mighty wizard in a now forgotten kingdom. His hunger for power led him to delve deeper and deeper into mysteries man was never meant to know, and as his quest lead him further down his dark path, he also became obsessed with immortality. Through nigromantic rituals and deals with old and best forgotten entities, he managed to cheat Dìs of his due.

Some art to ease you over

Lately Blogger has been making some decisions on it's own as to when certain posts should become public. For that reason, today's post appeared on your feed/reader a few hours before it was ready, tomorrow's did the same just now. To avoid people coming here to read about the Painted Man when there is no new post on that subject up as of yet, I'm giving you something else to occupy you with while I'm finishing up for the day.

As I've mentioned, I had the opportunity to visit Tate Modern a week or so ago. One of the artists I was made aware of was Helmut Herzfeld, a.k.a. John Heartfield [Wiki], a pioneer of photomontage. Some of his most famous work was done in the years between World War One and Two, and calling his art political may be an understatement. Since this post is thrown together in a hurry, I'll cut the introduction short and give you the art.

The Prince of Ashes

He seemed an island of quiet, unearthly elegance where he stood, on one of the few remaining towers of Castel Vigilius in Borgen, Cora's capital. Until recently, this had been the home of the Knights of St. Invictus. The city had been bombarded night and day for two months before it fell. They had rained fire, plague and acid on it, demons and guldamoths had thrown themselves against it's defences, and a hundred nigromancers had torn at the very fundaments of it's reality. Then it had fallen. It's fortifications crumbled, it's once magnificent temples, those few that had survived the onslaught, stripped and defiled. Hardly a single house was undamaged, and an unnatural, viscous, dark mist lay like a dirty shroud over the once proud and defiant city.

Evolution: The Malleable Paradigm

Yesterday I began the Evolution-project, and today I'll have a look at one of the fundamental concepts of Argos. I'm talking about how reality is defined, or, what governs the fundamental laws of reality. I'm not sure this will make a lot of sense to everyone, but the way I see it, this is perhaps the single most defining phenomenon in this world.

The Evolution of a World

Lately I've been talking a bit about endings, but after every end there is a beginning. Even if the Pius Chronicles are drawing to a close, Argos will live on. The world has been a big part of my life for some years now, and I do not feel like we will be parting ways just yet. Great and terrible things have happened to it since I first visited it. Though nearly, but not quite cataclysmic, these events have greatly changed the world. Some of these events have been played out, others must be allowed to run their course. This post is the first in what will likely be a new series, where I pour out some of my thoughts on how the world will look once the dust has settled. If I'm lucky, this will take Argos into the Fourth Age.

World of Darkness: Tower of Lost Hope

 

I went to London last weekend, and while there I visited the Tate Modern. One of the exhibitions showcased brutalist architecture around the world, and it was here that I saw the lifeless, scarred concrete sculpture* of the Lebanese Burj al Murr. The thing was as tall as I am, and it slammed into my imagination with ruthless brutality.

Burj al Murr
Locus lllll

Located in down-town Beirut, this ugly 40 story tower dominates the skyline. In times not at all long past, it also dominated the city in a different way. The construction of the Murr Tower was begun in 1974, and when the Lebanese civil war erupted in -75, 28 of the tower's floors had been completed. Despite the unrest, the work continued until the whole structure had been erected. Battle-scarred even before it was finished, the tower found it's function in 1978, as a sniper-position that could dominate and terrorise the surrounding city, two kilometres out from it's base.

Story-boarding as a roleplaying-technique

"Understanding is a three-edged sword."

-Vorlon saying

I've found that what I've been focussing on the most now that the epic Pius Chronicles are coming to an end, is how to achieve a narrative flow that ensures that all those who tell the story has, a) a feeling of involvement in, and ownership with, the tale told, and b) a sense of continuity in plot, setting, and action. The roleplaying trope is that the GM has the final say on the plot and the setting, and the players influence this through their characters. Whether the form of play is sand-boxing or rail-roading, or falls somewhere in between those two axes, this balance is deeply rooted in the culture of the hobby; most core-books have some version of, "the GM has final call over what is accepted in the game," clearly stated at least once.

Hero: Yolander van Zaar

“I am Yolander van Zaar - and you have no place in the future!”

[The picture is painted in modern Wezellian fashion, sometime during the spring of YE 1022 when the cabal returned from the Dark Continent and set out to gather the Convocation.]


Storyteller's note: I tried this last night, but due to some formatting issues, I had to delete that post. Now that has been dealt with, and here it is. The bio is written by Håvard.