Roleplaying games from historical research
I’m recording a biography of the Dogaressas of Venice over at Librivox, and as I’m going I’m pulling out folklore which is of particular interest to Ars Magica players. In this episode, the author of the biography goes to some length to describe the militancy of the forebears of the Venetians. Venice’s history begins with…
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Vast oceans of time ago, I noted an almost-saint for Hermetic magicians. Cyprian was a student who sold his soul for infernal tutoring in spellcasting. He then turned on his tutor, and became a Christian martyr. In Hermetic Europe he became a saint. He’s the St Cyprian of Antioch after whom the church at Valnastium…
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This week an introduction to Venetian women, as part of the ongoing series of Venetian episodes. When I originally designed the Venetian episodes, I was going to write a cumulative story like “Thirty Objects of Desire” or the Rosaline stories. As such there was a twist at the end and I’d been keeping the twist…
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This is a tiny episode that I’ve snuck into the last few minutes of my monthly podcasting plan. There’s a story, in Unprofessional Tales by Normyx, called “Nerida”, which he later expanded it into a full novel. I’m going to stat Nerida up eventually: she’s a succubus but here are the perambulations away from that…
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Norman Douglas wrote a set of short stories called Unprofessional Tales under the pseudonym Normyx. Two of these have monsters that can be usefully grabbed for Ars Magica. Both of them are demons. In the Red Sea is a beautiful example of what demonic oppression feels like in the Ars Magica game. Stats eventually. In…
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The last of the little sea songs being put up as plot hooks in a single pack. NOW the spring is in the town,Now the wind is in the tree,And the wintered keels go downTo the calling of the sea. Out from mooring, dock, and slip,Through the harbor buoys they glide,Drawing seaward till they dipTo…
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This is one of the little sea stories I’ve putting out in a group. It’s parto f a larger work called The Defence of Guenevere, which I’ll be going back to later. A ship with shields before the sun,Six maidens round the mast,A red-gold crown on every one,A green gown on the last. The fluttering…
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Another little poem or song that the characters could hear while on the road, serving as a later hook. THE waves in thunderous menace breakUpon the rocks below my tower,And none will dare the Sea-king’s powerAnd venture shipwreck for my sake. Yet once,–my lamp a path of lightAcross the darkling sea had cast–I saw a…
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For the Cornish material I was looking at sea stories and songs, which might serve as plot hooks. Here’s one that the players could overhear, sung in a resting place while they are on the way to another adventure, that would later serve as a hook. The recording was released into the public domain through…
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I like this poem as a description of a spirit that a Verditius, from the a sacred architecture Mystery Cult, wants as his familiar. I suggest this spirit is fascinated by the structures humans make, and as it passes it elaborates, or even copies, them. The humanoid form it can create might appear as a…
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Games From Folktales 