20 Deadly Planes: An Overview

Some planes can be visited. Not these. Some planes can be contacted in order to commune with alien intelligences or to summon forth various entities. Not these. Raw and inherently hostile, these are not destinations. These are not places in which to seek enlightenment, nor to beg assistance. Nothing exists to be contacted or to answer any summons. Desolate and decaying, these are broken places, unoccupied and void regions, these sidereal abysses are extremely dangerous, but they have their uses...

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Twenty Deadly Planes: An Overview
More often than not the so-called 'Twenty Deadly Planes' are referred to by way of a common symbol. The true name(s) of these planes, if they actually have any such things, are not provided in any of the primary sources which tend to make use of 'Lesser Epithets,' or obscure hieroglyphs when not employing the common symbols. Modern scholars have adopted either the Lesser Epithets or the accepted translation of the older hieroglyphs, or use a combined version that incorporates both into something a bit more poetic sounding. Tastes vary. As do results.

These planes are only ever involved in the inflicting of damage. A wide array of Currents, Bolts, Missiles and other attack forms utilizing the highly unstable energies of these planes are detailed in dozens of primers and texts. There are also a range of Defensive Wards and Protection spells that fend off the worst effects of the energy currents drawn from these planes. There are also a number of Wall and Barrier Spells that draw upon these planes. There are no summoning, no banishing, none of those sorts of spells for these planes. Most of the primary sources also tend to gloss over the risk of madness that tends to go along with utilizing these forces in one's spells.

Table One: Twenty Deadly Planes

d20	Common Symbol	Lesser Epithet	Translated Hieroglyph	Damage Type	Risk of Insanity %
1	Roughly-etched square with three yellow droplets in the lower left-hand corner.	Crumbling Ottrabar	Clinging Yellow Ichor	Corrosive Decay	5%
2	Black trapezoid of ashes.	Ashen Wastes of Black Attush	Hot Black Ashes	Heat, Rapid Acidification	10%
3	Green zig-zags, preferably etched with acid.	Smoldering Karzig	Hot Green Vastness	Toxic, Heat	3%
4	A gray puddle.	Cold Gray Seas of Zou-Dagra	Frigid Gray Alkaline Pools	Cold, Toxic, Alkali	5%
5	Mirror shards arranged in a sort of maze.	Glass Labyrinth or Laar Perda	Transparent Mineral Growths	Telepathic, Physical Destruction	25%
6	Five green dots.	Killing Rains of Jag Nesir	Hot Green Acid	Physical Destruction (Acid)	30%
7	Fractured black ovoid.	Black Empty Zillig	Hot Dark Entropic Abyss	Hot, Psychic (Empathic Collapse)	95%
8	Single amber tear.	Temoor's Tears	Cold Yellow Acid Clouds	Cold, Acid	7%
9	Blue smear.	Schor Jangul	Toxic Blue Dust	Toxic, Destroys Language/Verbal Ability	75%
10	Gray triangle.	Gray Ice of Kan-Kumy	Cold Gray Flames	Cold, Consumes Shadow	50%
11	Screaming mouth-glyph.	Screaming Botjay	White Psychic Cacophony	Psychic, Nervous System Destruction	95%
12	Three red wavy lines.	Howling Red Ler-Bica	Cold Scarlet Winds	Disorientation, Cold	3%
13	Random brown scribbles.	Dirch Brun Fal	Dry Brown Fog	Desiccation	5%
14	Amorphous blob with burned edges.	Selinoth Yr	Smoldering White Jelly	Smothering, Acid, Heat	30%
15	Half-dissolved femur.	Red Kulva	Bone-Dissolving Red Light	Physical Destruction	45%
16	Bright yellow angle, sometimes mistaken for a poorly drawn 'V.'	Wrathful Gomaq	Angular Yellow Momentum	Extreme Physical Destruction	10%
17	Violet triangle or icicle-glyph.	Grosilz Pel	Hot Violet Ice	Hot, Cold, Crushing (Ice)	3%
18	Raw vertical slash.	Tid'urm Aneff	Silent Rainbow	Terminal Stillness	80%
19	Scattering of iron nails.	Sea of Jageld	Hot Iron Tides	Hot, Crushing, Tides	5%
20	Inverted, iridescent-black three-step pyramid.	Dim Abyss of Orgythe	Devouring Void	Extreme Aging, Draining, Ultimate Destruction	99%

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Insanity: The chance that the caster goes insane from coming into temporary synchrony with one of these planes is reduced by 5% per level above the 5th. Those driven insane by their trafficking with these highly inimical planes remain that way for as many hours as they have levels. However, upon regaining their sanity, another Save is required, failure incurs a permanent penalty of -1 to all subsequent Saves versus madness and insanity effects.

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Damage Type: These are necessarily vague and incomplete, as each instance and encounter is going to have some unique qualities to it due to the variables involved. The types of damage specified in the table above are the types of effects most commonly reported or recorded in conjunction with each of these planes.

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Notes
Attempting to Contact these planes (as per the Cleric spell Contact Other Plane, Labyrinth Lord, p. 29, or by way of one of the alternative Contact Plane spells) will require the caster to Save. Success causes 1d4 damage and a temporary loss of one spell-slot for 1d4 days. Failure causes 1d4 damage per level of the caster as well as requiring a second Save to avoid temporary insanity. Failing the second Save, roll the d% indicated, the insanity persists for 1d4 days, after which they will certainly have gained a valuable insight into the nature of these planes, as well as gaining a +1 to all subsequent Saves against incurring temporary insanity on the Risk of Insanity table above. In this specialized instance, no questions are asked or answered, instead the caster gains the ability to incorporate the contacted plane's damage type as a secondary effect of their spells for 1d4 days. If they are conversant with the Lower Forms, they can now empower one of those spells with the energies of the contacted plane. they can now consider moving on to forming a Link, but there are no known methods that have proven effective for attuning to these planes. At least not currently available within the published literature or usual sources. There are rumors of strange sects and bizarre undead entities that have mastered the intricacies of attuning themselves to these planes, but that is all unsubstantiated rumor and hearsay at the moment.

First Contact with any of these twenty planes results in an outburst of the corresponding energies, causing 4d6 damage (Plus 1d4 per level of caster involved) within a 10' radius sphere. It is very unlikely that anyone could form a reliable Link from the initial contact attempt. But it is possible. Let's say there's a 1% chance. Oh and they still need to Save or roll % to see if they are driven insane. These are Deadly Planes. Meddling with these sorts of forces are dangerous and not for the weak or muddled.

Subsequent Exposure and Making a Connection: Each subsequent attempt to contact one of these planes has a spill-over effect that causes 1d4 damage per level of the caster within a 10' radius. The % chance of establishing a connection to the plane improves by 5% (plus the caster's Prime Ability Modifier). They must make a Save during each such attempt. Failing the Save requires the caster to roll a d% and consulting the Risk of Insanity Column in Table One above. Rolling the amount listed or below results in temporary insanity.

Attempting to Attune to any of these planes results in 3d6 damage per level of the caster erupting out across a 30' radius and forcing the caster to Save at -4. Failing to Save results in the caster suffering triple damage and everyone else within the 30' radius of effect suffering full damage even if they made their personal Save.

Creating an open or unbound Link to one of these planes inflicts 1d6 damage upon everything within a 20' radius and require a Save. Failing the Save requires the caster to roll a d% and consulting the Risk of Insanity Column in Table One above. Rolling the amount listed or below results in temporary insanity. Also, those planes listed with multiple damage types inflict 1d6 of each damage type. Such a Link tends to only last for a few seconds, unless the caster fails their Save, in which case such an unbound Link may persist for 1d4 Turns, causing damage each Turn, until the Link collapses. Most sources agree on using Squares to bind such Links, so long as the Link is intended to be embedded into a Lens or similar item. The more reputable manuals and mentors will warn that the use of Triangles will cause the very agitated Link to inflict triple normal damage, with a chance (equal to the Insanity %) of forming a lingering Vortex (triple normal duration). Once a Link has been successfully formed, it can be re-formed at will at a cost of 1 hit point for every 1d4 damage caused through the link. There are quite a number of ways to incorporate Links into spells, rites, items or workings. It is considered one of the fundamentals of effective sorcery, and a prerequisite for what comes next.

Vortices formed from the energies of these planes are highly unstable and will only persist if constantly reinforced or replenished. These Vortices cannot be rendered static, nor anchored. They traverse a random course for their duration and can sometimes turn back on the originating caster. These Vortices tend to last 1 Turn per level of the caster.

Tapping these planes is far more difficult than forming a temporary Link and is best left to those with great confidence in their abilities and knowledge. Planar Taps keyed to these planes are extremely dangerous, highly unstable and have a tendency to collapse in spectacular explosions on par with fireball and lightning bolt spells. The current, prevailing trend of thought is to first establish a Link, then expand it into a full Tap once it is already mostly embedded in the designated matrix-object, most often a Lens. Attempts to embed a Tap into a melee weapon are mostly discouraged as there is no effective means available for shielding the wielder from the effects of the current of planar force flowing through the Tap.

Attempting to erect a Portal to any of these planes results in 6d6 damage for everything caught within 30' radius of the attempted portal site. Re-roll for each separate damage type listed. This effect will persist for 1 Turn per level of the caster. The Caster is required to Save at -4 or take triple damage. Those casters slain in this manner are non-recoverable. There are too many variables to take into consideration, however it is very likely that this sort of incident would indeed form one or more Vortices.

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20 Deadly Planes I: Overview   |   20 Deadly Planes II: Excerpts from a Banned Manual
20 Deadly Planes III: 20 Sample Spells   |   20 Deadly Planar Lenses

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The most common object or item making use of these energies are Planar Lenses, with Wands being a close second. Several examples of these will be detailed at the blog fairly soonish. Bujilli recently gained a wand that works off of this system in Episode 70. He just doesn't know it yet...

A Grimoire of spells and such derived from the Twenty Deadly Planes is forthcoming.

Purple Amber

Purple Amber comes to Wermspittle from the camps set up in the Purple Forest by various Refugees, foreigners, outcasts and others with nowhere else to go. These camps are poorly regulated, rarely monitored and barely managed. Usually someone sets up a lean-to or a tent, starts a fire and then either welcomes others to bed-down nearby or drives them off. It's very informal. Until someone starts a fight. Or a hungry beast prowls a bit too close...

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Gathering It Up
Amber-Gatherers tend to travel light, carrying everything they own on their backs. A few have acquired pack-animals but most make-do with what they can manage on their own. They rarely form groups larger than 5-6 individuals and they either learn to make their way through the woods quietly and carefully, or else they don't tend to last very long. They are also more likely to be carrying shovels, scrapers and brush-cutters than swords or axes. The Lumberjacks tend to take an exception to someone else wielding an axe near them and doing so often leads to taunts, jibes and challenges. Sometimes it's in good spirits or for fun, or at least it can start out that way, but these sorts of things tend to spin out of control very quickly. There may be some truth to the Midwives' mutterings about long-term exposure to this place having some sort of effect on people that goes deeper than just the Restless Slumbers.

Sophisticated Competition
Foragers sometimes duck out on their crews to go roaming through the Purple Forest, hoping to score a few decent-sized chunks of Purple Amber. More than a few disgruntled drop-outs and failed apprentices who've been relegated to the Forager-crews by their former mentors and masters have succeeded in either detecting Weak Points or erecting temporary portals to the Purple Forest. For some, it is a better life than working in the Corruption Trade...

Getting It Out...
Everybody knows that it is best to pack Purple Amber in wool or soft cloth, but in a pinch burlap or canvas will do. The stuff that gets really scratched-up can be sold for incense or oil-making. Most Foragers try to pack everything with a layer of smaller chunks and fragments, both to lock the larger chunks into place, and to maximize the pay-off for each load.

Smell That Entrepreneurial Spirit
Lumberjacks and brush-cutters sleep behind stout pallisades, a few have built motte-and-bailey style fortified depots to protect their point of access back into Wermspittle. The Lumber Forts are well-built and better patrolled. The Barons who run things are in rigorous competition with their rivals and sometimes raids take place unfortunate work-place accidents happen. The Lumber Companies pay well, but they expect a good return on their money. They don't let just anyone in through their well-guarded gates. Guarding these sites, keeping things reasonably safe and maintaining things has been a substantial investment and the accountants insist that fees, tolls and charges are attached to everything. They take an especially dim view of free-loaders or vagrants. Of course, there's always the opportunity to engage in a bit of discrete barter, especially when it can be done without having to report the transaction to their superiors and paying the requisite surcharges.

The Lumber Forts are notorious for the high cost of their hospitality. A handful of Purple Amber can make a lot of newfound friends in the Lumber Camps, but only for a short while. It is best not to over-stay one's welcome. It is also a good idea not to lose any sleep over what the same amount of Purple Amber might have fetched from a Buyer in King Clovine's Court. Better a safe place to sleep for a few hours than getting eaten by some hodag or grue.

Unlike the more settled and well-defended folk in the Lumber-Forts, amber-gatherers tend to stay more mobile, following the game trails and lake shores, going wherever they can find deposits of Purple Amber. They also tend to avoid the few roads hacked through the Deep Woods. The lumber companies charge a steep toll to use their roads and the mercenaries hired to patrol them are little better than bandits with a health plan. If you're desperate enough to go looking for Purple Amber, then using the roads is a good way to lose all your amber and possibly your life. A pound of Purple Amber is worth more than a pound of flesh, even in Winter. The buyers back in Wermspittle rarely ask how it was obtained; all they care about is the purity and quality of the stuff. After all, Like they say along the Low Streets; business is business and blood can be washed off.

You Get Used To It...
The Purple Forest and especially the Deep Woods are dangerous, but not much more than the back-alleys and Low Streets of Wermspittle. Anyone who's picked their way through the Burned Over Districts or been forced to take shelter inside one of the Abandoned Properties during a Spring Rain might actually prefer the woods over conditions back home. Of course there are no perytons or man-eating blue-striped bats in Wermspittle. Though there are grues.

At least seven Junctures have been discovered, all but two by Amber-Gatherers. Junctures are unstable cross-over points where the Purple Forest bleeds through into somewhere else. The two Junctures controlled by the Lumber Companies open onto vast tracts of wilderness that may or may not be located on other worlds. Neither Company has been particularly forthcoming in regards to the results of any exploration efforts they may have conducted. Trade Secrets and all that.

Werm-Riddled Manuscripts (Wermspittle)

There was a formula—a sort of list of things to say and do—which I recognised as something black and forbidden; something which I had read of before in furtive paragraphs of mixed abhorrence and fascination penned by those strange ancient delvers into the universe’s guarded secrets whose decaying texts I loved to absorb. It was a key—a guide—to certain gateways and transitions of which mystics have dreamed and whispered since the race was young, and which lead to freedoms and discoveries beyond the three dimensions and realms of life and matter that we know. Not for centuries had any man recalled its vital substance or known where to find it, but this book was very old indeed. No printing-press, but the hand of some half-crazed monk, had traced these ominous Latin phrases in uncials of awesome antiquity.

The Book,

by H. P. Lovecraft

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(10) Werm-Riddled Manuscripts: Probably Forbidden, Mostly Nameless and Otherwise Suspiciously Cheap...

1. Torn and smelly, this wad of crumbling old ages is secured into a messy sheaf by a rusty pin that has been driven through the entire stack of pages as though by a hammer or lump of dense rock. None of the pages are in consecutive order and whatever sequence seems to be in effect changes from reading to reading. The thing self-randomizes, switching languages even as it takes on a different page order, even the number of pages tends to change. It costs the permanent sacrifice of one 4th Level spell slot to read this manuscript all the way through in one evening, and doing so prematurely ages the reader by 4d10 years. What the reader gains...is the ability to claim one randomly determined spell in their personal repertoire as an At Will Ability that can be used as many times in a given 26-hour period as they have levels as a spell-caster.
2. Forty-three blank pages of high-quality paper all clipped together and affixed with a note written in blood-stained Garadic script, very neatly penned with a crisp nib. The note references Thumallian's Third Trance-State. Apparently, if the reader attempts to read this manuscript while in this particular trance-state, it will reveal its secret text.
3. Sixty-seven pages torn from a madman's diary or personal journal.  Each one contains the same sequence of tight, spidery non-letters that sprawl across the page in a most disturbing, unsavory manner. The curious script employed in this manuscript cannot be read by a rational mind. One must be mad in the first place in order to decipher the thing.
4. Five neatly-folded comics sections taken from a newspaper over a hundred years out of date. The paper is yellowing from more than just aging badly. Wrapped-up in those comics is an editorial section written in one of the most vile forms of Yellow Journalism. The very paper itself is saturated in the effluent left-over from the production of Yellow Wallpaper. This is highly toxic stuff, gone even more rancid and pernicious with age.
   

   [Reading/handling the crumbling Comics Pages require a Save at -1, failure inflicts Confusion on the reader for the next 3d6 hours. Success halves the duration. Examination of the Editorial Section requires a Save at -4, failure instills a very visceral -4 Charisma reaction against all members of a particular ethnic or political group. Success imprints the victim with a -2 Reaction Modifier against two such groups. In either case, the reader's hands are permanently stained a distinct yellowish tint, they are more prone to experiencing a distracting sort of melancholy when exposed to anything political (Save or 'lose' 1d10 minutes in a distracted state, unless engaged in vigorous activity), and they suffer a permanent -1 penalty on all Saves in relation to all White Powder derivatives.]

5. An old broadsheet advertising Doktor Malinkorov's Marvelous Medicinal Mortifactant. On the back someone has carefully illustrated all the steps required to fashion a set of Illudrian bone-lamellar armor, including how to properly attune the rig to various spectra of necromantic energies that Nagrothean Censors tend to expurgate from all modern texts.
6. Twenty-Six Hundred cardamom-scented foolscap pages packed into a heavy cardboard box reinforced with thin metal bands. Each page is densely scribbled upon and most who look upon these translucent pages for the first time are tempted to pass them over as meaningless. Those who persist in their examination go on to discover that each page contains a single self-contained statement drawn-out in one continuous line.
   

   [Upon initial examination, roll an Attribute Check against INT; need to succeed to go any further. Each set of 1d20 pages examined after a successful INT check grants the reader a cumulative 1% bonus to comprehend the secrets embedded in these labyrinth-like pages. The reader may attempt to comprehend the manuscript any time they like, rolling a D% and adding-on whatever bonus they've accumulated. Success means that they are now immune to the effects of the Maze spell. Failure means that they've been trapped within the manuscript itself for as many days as they have INT. Each day trapped within the manuscript costs them 1d12 months of aging. Once a reader has failed to comprehend this manuscript, further study is considered pointless. However there are hints whispered between certain book-sellers and librarians and those who seek after strange secrets that if one were to persist to the very end that there indeed are deep secrets buried in this manuscript. Whether or not there actually are, remains a matter of speculation. At least until someone conclusively makes it through the entire thing successfully.]

7. Nine black pages edged with gold. The first three are empty. Wiped clean by tears. Do you dare to read the fourth page to find out why?
8. Mold-stained and horribly creased, this manuscript has been stuffed into a rotten canvas courier bag for several years. Only thirty-five pages remain in the bag. The rest have been lost. There is no index, no table of contents, no title page. Half the pages are illegible. What remains appear to be diagrams and formulae for attracting the attentions of some sort of extra-dimensional form of sentient mold. Each page that gets handled inflicts a cumulative -1 penalty on the reader's Save against being poisoned. The mold on these pages will require a fresh Save after every 1d4 pages examined. Should the reader fail their Save, the mold spreads into their skin. Or rather under their skin. This mold isn't particularly sentient, at least not yet, but now that someone has volunteered to be its host, it will slowly devour their INT and WIS and CHAR until it achieves a cold, cruel form of consciousness that will replace everything they lose to the process.
   

   [This is no simple parasite. It is a symbiotic organism. One that gives as good as it gets, if not better. The victim feels no pain from the process whatsoever. If anything they feel more clear-headed and awake than ever before in their life, even gaining a +1 bonus to all INT & WIS checks, and Immunity to all forms of illusion, charms and hypnosis. The mold integrates itself into the host's flesh, eventually replacing their entire skin and giving them a very distinctive appearance, one apprentice has described as being akin to "...a waxy coating over mottled patches of lint, ashes and chalk dust." Each week from the moment of infection, the host must make a Save, failure meaning that they suffer a loss of 1 CHAR point, success causes them 1d4 damage and intermittent but intense vertigo that somehow only strikes whenever they attempt to cast a spell or try to read. Upon reaching a CHAR score of 3, the host's mind, brain and body have been completely consumed, they get to re-roll all their stats and begin life as a new being. It is unclear whether their soul survives this transformation, or if it is somehow destroyed, displaced or simply replaced. The new entity that is produced by this process does seem to possess a soul, but it is definitely not the original host's, that much was proven in a battery of experiments conducted by Franidar, Murleff and Clevong under the aegis of the Grenavior Occupation. Unfortunately, most of their records were subsequently lost in the course of their trial for war crimes.]

9. Sixteen feet of coarsely-knotted rough twine securely holds together a stack of rough-edged sheets of pressed yellow-green seaweed, block-printed with a range of grotesque trapezoidal glyphs unlike anything most bibliophiles are ever likely to see in the waking world. The ink is thick upon the fibrous pages. Redolent of Purple Amber. The glyphs are generally indecipherable as they are not rational constructs, but rather a complex cluster of praeterhuman oneiro-tactile intuition-stimulae with a tendency to unlock deeply repressed memories and long suppressed trauma in those who brood upon them for more than a few minutes quick glance. The glyphs have been bound into the loose pages of this manuscript well past their tolerance for such things. They desire to be set free. Will you release them?
10. One Hundred pages of poor quality typewriter-paper wrapped-up in the entrails of three large toads. The whole thing reeks of burnt flesh -- the typewriter ribbon used for this manuscript was derived from Black Smoke. Roughly a third of the pages have been ruined by exposure to water. What remains is a first-person account of the siege of Tarlonna composed by a Morlock combat-engineer who lost more than just their left arm at that historic battle. Perusing these pages will require experience with a great deal of intellectually opaque Morlock military slang, hence why the seven publishers it was submitted to all rejected it out of hand. The rejection slips are interspersed randomly through the manuscript as bookmarks denoting sections requiring extra attention, editing and revision.

Maelstrom (Monster/Effect/Portal-Type)

Image by Harry Clarke from the 1919 edition of E. A. Poe's 'Tales of Mystery and Imagination.'
You can also download a copy of this image to use via Wikimedia Commons, as it is in the Public Domain.

Halloween is fast approaching and this is my favorite time of the year to revisit and re-read a bit of Mr. Poe's gruesome, decadent tales and poetry. Or listen to that album by Alan Parsons...while re-reading some of Mr. Poe's lurid prose. And a piece of fresh-baked pumpkin pie or a really good pumpkin stout...yeah.

ahem.

"The ways of God in Nature, as in Providence, are not as our ways; nor are the models that we frame any way commensurate to the vastness, profundity, and unsearchableness of His works, which have a depth in them greater than the well of Democritus."

Joseph Glanville (Note: Poe substantially revised the original quote...)

In Poe's tale 'A Descent Into the Maelstrom,' he presents a survivor's account of having nearly been swallowed-up by a massive whirlpool. The old sailor recounts his terrifying experience in the course of a mountain-climbing trip in Norway. He tells his companions of his shipwreck during a hurricane, getting caught in the swirling, churning grasp of the watery vortex and his eventual rescue, after witnessing the horrific descent of his brother into madness and oblivion while he survived because he made good use of his powers of observation and reasoning. The sad, lone survivor of this encounter with the Maelstrom was wizened, weakened and aged terribly by his ordeal.

Much feared as hazards to navigation, even as monsters unto themselves, whirlpools such as those off the coast of Norway such as Mokstraumen, one of the most notorious such vortexes known since even before medieval times, have featured prominently in old sailor's tales and in folklore as rivals to sea serpents, leviathans, and krakens. Whirlpools were regarded with awe and a healthy respect, as they could break-up or sink a good ship, and there was little that could be done about it, save to avoid the things in the first place.

But are they best represented as Monsters or Environmental Effects/Events?

Here's a Monster write-up for Labyrinth Lord to consider:

Maelstrom
No. Enc.: 1
Alignment: Chaotic (Evil)
Movement: n/a
Armor Class: n/a
Hit Dice: 8
Attacks: 1
Damage: see below
Save: n/a
Morale: n/a
Hoard Class: Detritus & Debris

Special: On the outer periphery the Maelstrom inflicts 1d6 damage to anyone/anything coming within reach of its swirling, churning turbulence. A Save must be made or the victim (be it ship, sailor or shark) becomes trapped in the vortex. Those so captured either suffer a progressive 1d6 in damage (either roll to Hit or use a Save), or they are drained of 1 point of CON or WIS (player's choice). This process repeats itself for 1d6 turns, after which the victim either is sucked down to the bottom of the sea, or they are rescued by someone operating outside the perimeter of the vortex. Those lost to the vortex are non-recoverable and never seen again. Anyone surviving such an encounter is aged severely (becoming Elderly or Venerable, using the Ability Adjustments Due to Age Table on p.23 of Advanced Edition Companion, or something similar.)

As a Monster, such a vortex might be some sort of Elemental Being. Or it could be the effect produced by a gargantuan fishy-thing deep below the surface of the water, such as Charybdis, some folk's re-interpretation of the Welsh Afanc or the afore-mentioned Leviathan, but that tends to get Biblical, enviously demonic or Moby-Dickish...even Hobbesian. But all that could just be so many odd-ball tangents to waste spend a few hours following the links down the rabbit-hole. If a Maelstrom is some sort of specialized Elemental, the special attack of a demented demonically-possessed albino whale, or some dreadful crowned prince of the Infernal Regions who somehow got lost at sea (possibly there is some evil artifact down there, beneath the waves, stirring up all this turmoil and terror? Could be. (We really need to write-up a Charybdaiad now though...)

...

But what if the Maelstrom were a more natural sort of thing, a large, and dangerous Environmental Effect, and not just another monster in some scribe's exaggerated bestiary? (or it could be both, really...)

That sounds like a job for a Random Table...

Maelstrom as Hazard to Navigation Table

1. The turgid, foamy waters subside within the next fifteen minutes; you just missed it. Ship or swimmers take 2d4 damage and make a Save at +2 to avoid getting dragged under by the last dregs of the whirlpool. It will be back in another 1d6 hours.
2. Everything seemed peaceful, serene and reasonably calm...then the waters became agitated, choppy, increasingly chaotic as a huge roaring, spiraling cataract formed in seconds, smashing everything caught within it for 4d6 damage and threatening to capsize or split asunder any vessel unlucky enough to get snared in the treacherous currents.
3. It started slowly, at first. A weak swirliness in the waters just off the point. So many tiny ripples. Easy to overlook or ignore as just some minor churning brought on by the weather, the passage of some whale, or whatever. Then it got worse. More intense. Every minute the waters grew more and more agitated. Then it was too late. A whirlpool churned and turned, making the channel a death trap for any ship caught within its watery grasp. (Save or Sink. Extends for a substantial circumference, perhaps up to half a mile...)
4. "All of a sudden, it's got you..." Everything went blue. Deep, vivid blue. You've gotten snared by the vortex produced by a hitherto unknown Blue Hole. It strikes by surprise, from below, forcing a Save at -2 to avoid getting swept away in the powerful currents.
5. The tides shift even as the winds pick up from the south. Menacing clouds boil across the darkening sky as heavy weather moves in fast. There's a hurricane blowing in and this stretch of water is now riddled with 2d6 whirlpools of random size and strength. Good luck.
6. The whirlpool was clearly marked in the Carta Marina and other such charts. But your captain insisted on risking the passage. Now whatever demons might have been haunting him, driving him on so recklessly have done for you all--the Maelstrom is raging and roaring and spinning at full force and the ship is crumbling to pieces beneath you...

Whether or not there's anyone out there to rescue those who run afoul of such a whirlpool...well...that's best left up to the DM.

...

But what if such vortexes and whirlpools were not just monstrous things or environmental quirks? What if they also somehow provided a highly dangerous means of crossing-over to some Adjacent World, Parallel Realm, or some other plane of existence? Could such a whirlpool connect to some alien ocean or weird elemental realm of some sort?

Why not? Maybe that whirlpool you've just discovered is some sort of fluctuating gateway to some other place, some distant region of existence where things aren't quite the same as here. Maybe it is some sort of Weak Point, or the ongoing effect of some malfunctioning Transition Mechanism trapped deep beneath the waves. It could be a gateway to all kinds of adventures. Maybe such a thing might make for another entry in Porky's ongoing Community Project 'The Ends,' which you can find here.

Ectography

Ectography is an arcane technique used in capturing images of non-physical or trans-physical objects, items or entities. It originated with the ancient, crude  camera obscuras and skrying boxes used by phantasmagorists, mediums and evocationaries, but developed into its own thing fairly quickly as alchemists and others sought to replicate the results gained by some of the more successful mediums. Trial and error led to myriad breakthroughs and dead ends alike, but the conventional configuration of lenses, fluid condensers, mirrors, and heavily lacquered black boxes was arrived at more than seven hundred years ago, perhaps more than a thousand years ago if the claims of Archimbaldo and Lange are to be taken seriously. But since they also are the main proponents of some of the wilder paleo-astronomy theories currently in vogue among the more lurid publications, their claim as to the pedigree of ectography is somewhat in doubt.

Ectography makes use of a bitumen-based solution on glass plates, as with heliotropes, but it also relies upon a formulation of silver nitrate, as per daguerreotypes, and in addition it only works in conditions of darkness and in the presence of ectoplasm. The first models could only be worked by a physical medium, or with the assistance of one or more practising mediums, making it difficult to use and unwieldy in general. The use of certain salts in the formulation of the primary solution made the ectographic cameras usable by non-mediums. There is rigorous debate to this day over what formulation or solution is the best or most effective. Some ectographers prefer a preliminary bath of colloidal silver to prime their glass plates, others insist on necrocineris, black saltes, or even a derivative of White Powder, while still others will only work with a paste made from ground-up old mummies and certain 'secret ingredients' they insist must be compounded during certain phases of the moon. Certain schools teach their students to always use specific grades of incense for best results, others avoid smoke of all sorts and instead make use of pans of fresh-drawn blood, or even less wholesome methods. There are hundreds of different, competing formulations and techniques in use and each one has its merits; those methods that did not produce effective results were cast aside long ago. A direct predecessor of Haemotypes (see here for an example), the images produced by ectography are derived from ectoplasm, not blood. At least not directly.

Modern ectography combines a sort of psychometry with ectoplasmic senstivity, but now the camera-mechanism is at least as much the active medium as any sitter or ectopath that the ectographer might be employ. The cameras often become extremely sensitive due to long exposure to the various volatile compounds used in the process. Some cameras are reputed to have become haunted. Other have been confiscated for use as spirit-traps or worse. It is a volatile and complicated field, rife with competing adepts, (literally) cut-throat experts and not a few incautious dabblers or unscrupulous charlatans who often stir up a great deal of trouble, especially wherever there might be Horlas or Fantomists involved.

Ectography was originally established as a viable artistic method and technique well before the Midwives' Rebellion and has continued to grow, evolve and fragment into dozens of specializations, unique sub-disciplines and spin-off techniques that in some cases threaten to eclipse the old approaches with their newfangled ways of producing evocative images, whether they are capturing the impressions of dreams, showing the true face of those who are not what they seem, revealing otherwise invisible things, a dying man's last memories, the last thing seen by a murder victim, or some bizarre montage of disjointed impressions taken across planar membranes, through time, or even more outlandish and outrageous things. Ectographers are a strange lot, always pushing back the boundaries of what can be seen, often with a total disregard for whether or not these things should be seen, or the consequences of making such things visible.

Recent experiments in time-lapse ectography near some of the more stable Weak Points have revealed what may be a dangerous new approach to transplanar exploration...if the glass plates that survived the carnage that has left three ectographers dead and seven missing are any indication...

Paraversal Planes: Vhonj

Vhonj is a plane made up of interconnecting strands of filamentous landscapes -- Landstrands -- predominantly scalding hot purplish deserts facing the Jewel-suns and scathingly frigid mountainous regions that are turned outwards into the cold, black void. Each of the myriad of interlocking, interlacing land-strands are tangled around a cluster of hot, jewel-faceted suns. In the deep distance there appear to be other, rival clusters of faceted suns surrounded by their own tangled skeins of terrain.

The air is hot, but breathable. The gravity is close enough to normal to not be an issue. The sun is a massive, faceted object that never sets. The sands are dozens of shades of purple. Time passes normally enough, and eight hours is still eight hours, so recovery of spells and healing follow the usual time restrictions, you just don't get any darkness on the sunny side of a Landstrand is all.

A typical Vhonjian 'land-strand'

Vhonj is an old, old place grown bitter and desolate with age and neglect. The days of great empires have come and gone long ago and only scattered ruins, buried tombs and obscure reliquaries remain as monuments and reminders of those who have gone before. Colossal statues and massive idols rear drunkenly out of the hot purple sands of the sunward deserts, each one pitted and eroded into untrue shapes by the erratic caress of the grit-laden winds. On the colder, forlorn and ice-shrouded darkward side of things entire mountains that have been molded and reshaped into strange bas reliefs of incredible scale that few prying eyes have beheld in millennia.

Transplanar Migrations of Pilgrims come to Vhonj, and those who prey upon such, as well as those who would protect them for a price. Bandits, grave-robbers and looters of all sorts and types wander the hot sands and frigid wastes of Vhonj looking for abandoned tombs, forgotten crypts, and whatever pickings they might come across--for this is a realm noted for its peculiar, often unforeseen opportunities for those engaged in their sordid trades. It is not for nothing that the quadrolophic sages of Palza refer to Vhonj as the 'ossuary of secrets.' The Land-strands of Vhonj are encrusted and piled with multitudes of inhuman  mortuaria, alien cenotaphs and strange geomantically-aligned  barrows pre-dating most of the currently active species, known worlds or legendary civilizations. Beings have been leaving dead, deceased and defunct things here for longer than anyone can accurately estimate. Other entities have been pilfering these graves for almost as long.

Few Weak Points offer passage to this plane, though use of certain Amethysts are rumored to be able to make a Weak Point resonate to Vhonj well enough to provide temporary access. The most common means of travel to Vhonj is via a Synchronocitor, though there are rumors of Cthonic Vortexes at the junctures of underground rivers and the inverted ley-lines of the Interior Cavern-systems of the land-strands.

Purple Forest (Paraversal Planes)

The Purple Forest is mentioned in numerous sources available to the majority of scholars, students or sorcerers. Indeed it is one of the most well-documented and often visited Planar Realms known to nearly all reputable modern practitioners of those transgressive arts that delve into the mysteries of the Paraversal Planes and all such strange spaces.

Getting There
One could attempt to warp a free-floating Weak Point into temporary alignment with other spaces, including the Purple Forest, but the abuse of Violet Polyhedrae in such a manner is frowned upon by the authorities as it can lead to spill-overs, leaks and energetic bleeds that can often prove quite problematic. Attempting such a stunt is an offense leading to almost certain expulsion from the Academy. So, of course, those inclined to dabble in such proscribed things tend to go out into one of the Abandoned Properties and do it in secret. Black Trapezoids are also rumored to be useful in this context, but useful details are scant.

There is also Jakub's Door, a static portal anchored within a lop-sided door-frame on the third floor of a half-collapsed tenement deep within the Burned Over District. The location of Jakub's Door is only shared via word of mouth among those who have worked their way up the ranks as a Forager. It is a secret only revealed to those who have proven themselves to one who already knows the secret.

The most common way to get to the Purple Forest is to make use of the Triple Circle spell. It is not at all uncommon for mentors, patrons or employers to cast this spell and send parties of expendable cheap gullible  dedicated explorers through to collect purple amber, various exotic herbs, peculiar pollen, and other such things that have numerous uses and applications, especially to Fantomists, Oneirists, Somnambulists and some of the more obscure Teratosophists.

What's It Like?
Purple. Very, very purple. As far as anyone has ever explored or claimed to have gone, this whole realm is one vast, multi-continental lushly overgrown old-growth forest that seemingly extends onward and outward forever. There are few roads, and what trails there are tend to get overgrown by thorns and other brush fairly quick. The skies are perpetually overcast, gloomy and drizzle cold rain far too often. There are parts of the Purple Forest that do experience a type of winter, but overall the place seems to remain fairly even and stable when it comes to temperature.

A Dozen Fairly Common Encounters

1. (2d4) Deer or (1) really big porcupine with an attitude (30% chance of distemper or rabies).
2. (1d4) Koponu (Non-Union, and with a 40% chance of being drunk on fermented sap).
3. (1d4) Horned Bear (anything over the first one is a cub), they have 1d6 horns & the horns are worth a fair bit to a carver or horn-worker.
4. (1d2) Two-headed Boar or (1d4) Harpies scouting-out a potential new nest-site for their Tormenter Mistress.
5. (3d6) Woodsfolk or (1d4) dwarf-Molg.
6. (1d4) Hunters (Either Bows or spears; not many carry gonnes over here--the noise tends to rile-up and attract Big Nasty Things, like Huge Unseen Beasts or worse.)
7. (1d2) Gloomswallow
8. (1d4) Arborial Centipedes; these things have a distressing tendency to drop down from overhanging limbs and then curl tightly around their victim's heads/necks like living nooses. Maybe there is something to the old wives' tales about some renegade Midwives who ran off to the Purple Forest to avoid getting tossed into the asylum camps back during the Rebellion...
9. (1d4) Amber-Gatherers.
10. (2d6) Brigands who've managed to get themselves lost or (1) Midwife gathering herbs.
11. (1d20) Blue Zoogs or (1d4) Grikflits.
12. (1d4) Crudiv lurking in the thickets, scanning for opportunities.

There are rumors of peryton, man-sized bats, giant owls, and tribes of barbaric blue jay theriocephs out past the perimeter of the established enclaves.

Why Go There?
Foragers, foreigners and mercenaries are hired to go scrounge-up various things from the Purple Forest, as noted above, but the main attraction of this place is as a source of game during the harsh winters in Wermspittle; this is one of the ways that the Academy manages to feed its people during the worst of times. There are also several camps of lumberjacks and woodsfolk who have set themselves up to harvest, process and deliver a wide selection of choice woods especially useful in the creation of cabinets, ritual furniture, and other such applications, wood that is unique to this place. The huge bees that buzz across the scattered glades and hidden meadows are famous for the honey they produce, and that honey is greedily gathered for use in making mead that can go for three times the going rate of Dim Ichor or any of the mid-range brands of Black Liquors, especially in the Winter, when this mead is said to unlock even the deepest dreams. Then there is the trade in purple amber, which is used in the crafting of potent magical incenses, inks, oils and unguents and is an essential component in the concoction of the salves and fumigants used in the prosecution of the Four Great Seasonal Mysteries. The sap of certain trees in the Purple Forest is also used in the preparation of the Autumnal Carnifex in particular.

What Are People Saying About This Place?

1. Gloomswallows seem to drift across to the Purple Forest at-will, leading some oneirically-inclined scholars to assert that this might well be the birth-place of these things.
2. A shipment of (2d6) 'Sleeping Cabinets' were recently lost when the cart transporting them disappeared during a recent drizzle.
3. Solemn Nils of Paldramont has apparently found a way to bring over several dozen of his brigands and they have begun raiding some of the farther-out lumber camps and woodsfolk enclaves. Nils is notorious for his brutal methods and the enclaves closer to the more common points of entry are starting to hire-on ruffians, louts and mercenaries in order to protect them from further raids.
4. The Dalgaztri Camp hired-on some Urglun mercenaries only to have the things take over the place and enslave their employers. They seem to be building a fortress. The only reason anyone knows about this turn of events is that a small group of hunters escaped and are trying to raise a group of volunteers to go back and liberate their people.
5. A cache of high-grade purple amber is said to be stashed within the upper stories of the mostly burned-out Black Tambourine Inn.
6. A small group of Refugees is trying to hire someone to cast the Triple Circle spell for them. They have a goodly amount of coinage to offer, but something just doesn't sound right about the arrangement.
7. Midwives tell of any number of beautiful pools out past the queen-hives. These pools have special properties and effects. Sometimes the water retains this quality, other time not. One might be able to restore a fractured mind, or mend a tattered soul at the right pool, were one to know which one to seek out...
8. A small clique of brewers have decided to break free of the Corruption Trade, stop producing Black Liquors, and focus on making several varieties of mead and blended metheglins from the honey gathered from the Purple Forest. They'll need some protection, and a few good Foragers who'll work for them as they try to get set-up and running...

Why Doesn't Everyone Just Go There?

• Anyone with a CON lower than 15 must make a Save every 4 hours or else come down with the Restless Slumbers. This is an illness that makes it increasingly difficult for those affected to recover hit points or spells while in the Purple Forest. Those who contract this condition also receive a permanent -2 on all Saves versus Oneiric and Somnambulistic spell effects. Leaving the Purple Forest will allow those affected to shrug off the effect over 1d4 months (Make a Save at -4 first month, -3 the next, -2 next, -1 after that).
• Anyone who dies (or whose body is dumped) out in the Deep Woods has a tendency to get colonized by weird fungi. Some of these shambling things come back, others just decompose into the soil, and some allow the fungi to develop strange new hybrid forms.
• Dreamers who spend overlong in the Purple Forest tend to attract Gloomswallows, especially when they are asleep or in trance.

Jalamere: Encounters Within a 10 Mile Radius of the Black Ziggurat

This is a continuation of what we began in the previous Black Ziggurat of Jalamere post. We want to thank Blair of Planet Algol for his feed-back, encouragement and the contribution of a couple of entries to further flesh out the special encounters that might take place in the area surrounding this version of the Black Ziggurat.

[Get the free Swords & Wizardry (White Box) rules: http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/whitebox.htm]


Encounters Within a 10 Mile Radius of the Black Ziggurat

1. Spatter Moths: 3d6 fluttering moths alight upon one randomly selected victim, taking 1d4 rounds to finally settle into place. They emanate a feeling of calm and peace and trust. Then they explode, covering the victim with a viscous, radioactive sludge that will provoke a CON check or Save to avoid incurring some minor, insectile mutation.
2. Cuneiform Tablet: Stained, pitted and chipped, but still legible...if you know this particularly rare, even extinct form of pre-human cuneiform made up of spiral impressions of ammonite shells that were pressed into the raw clay to form cyclic patterns. The Tablet is worth hundreds of gold to a linguist, sage or scholar and it only weighs about 20 pounds, so it could be carried out of here. However, anyone falling asleep near this thing will find themself dreaming of Malevolent Monoliths that will begin to hunt them down in their dreams for 2d4 nights, after which time the Malevolent Monoliths will begin to hunt the dreamer(s) down in the physical realm, taking 1d4 nights to reach them.
3. Transparent Humanoid Corpse: Only their bones are visible and their head is missing.
4. Writhing Mass (Type II): 1d4 bulbous, pulsating pustule-like conglomerations of what appears to be disparate types of acne-pocked flesh that roll and flop along the ground like blind slugs, always seeking any living thing smaller than itself that it can enfold, crush and absorb.
5. Poisonous Purple Radiance: Glimmering purple effulgences corruscate and perambulate across the rocky wasteland, teasing the edges of every surface like some weird sort of foxfire that leaves small droplets of dew condensing behind upon any and everything it touches. The dew is poisonous. Save or go blind.
6. Old Shoggoth: 1 very old, very large Shoggoth is seen slithering along in the far distance. It seems to be ignoring you. For now. Faint cries of Tekeli Li! in the course of the next 2d4 nights make it all but impossible to sleep. But then the thing seems to disappear. Maybe it has gone away for good?
7. Arachnocacti: 2d8 eight-limbed cactus-spider hybrids wait patiently for someone to come within reach of their grasping claws or venomous maws. Each Arachnocacti can spray a mass of prickly webbing equivalent to a Web spell up to 4 times a day, and anyone caught in these webs takes 1d4 points of damage per round that they attempt to move...or are moved about, like say if they were grasped and picked-up by the creature's claws and dragged towards the slavering fly-trap-like central fang-rimmed maw. The only good thing about these creatures is that they tend to be rooted and it takes them 4d6 turns to extricate themselves from the rocky soil before they can follow any prey that manages to get away. Oh, and their flesh is super-saturated with clean, pure water, so if you kill one, you can replenish your canteens and water-skins.
8. Rulak: 1d4 creepy fungal things come slithering through the shimmering air with bad intent. (as detailed for Labyrinth Lord HERE. )
9. Masked Watchers: 2d6 black robed and masked figures appear in the distance; waver like mirages; disappear in seconds although one PC may hear strange whispers on the wind. (From Blair of Planet Algol.)
10. Raging Blob: 3,000 pounds of succulent gristle and sweet-smelling skin rougher than an elephant's rump comes rolling and tumbling down the nearest slope right at the party. If the blob can catch anyone on the roll, it will extrude tentacles and attempt to grapple with them, otherwise it will come to a stop as close to the main cluster of the group and strike out at as many victims as it can reach at once. If a tentacle ensnares a victim (60%) it will attempt to reel them in towards a freshly opened mouth. If the tentacle pierces the victim, it will spew a larval froth into the wound and then rip the harpoon-like member free of their flesh, doing double damage. Anyone 'frothed' by the Blob will need to make a Save or fall into a coma as their body transforms into a micro-blob producing factory...[Raging Blob Labyrinth Lord stats (+Paper Mini)]
11. Spine Thieves: 3d4 eel-faced hominids clad in woven plastic armor and armed with either shock prods or burn-sticks slither quietly out of the shadows and attempt to subdue one or more stragglers or other likely-looking victims. They will render their target insensible, fetter them with quickloops and plastic manacles, then begin to extract the spine. It is very unlikely that a natural vertebrate will survive this process. If the PCs kill all of the Spine Thieves they will discover 2d4 spines preserved in durable sacs of translucent green fluid and 1d4 Cerebracrystals.
12. Glyph Block: Random PC trips over or stubs toe (save or take 1 pt. damage) on corner of corroded basalt tablet/block embedded in sand. Examination reveals glyphs worn away into illegibility but sinister in form. May be worth 1d100 gp to the right buyer but doubles chance of nocturnal random encounters while in possession. (From Blair of Planet Algol.)
13. Hovering Blue Pentazoid: 1d12 fractured poly-planar crystal formations that cut across 1d30 planar layers, creating conditions conducive for a roll or three on the Damned Things Tables every hour spent within ten miles of this spot. The Pentazoids are hyper-intelligent and with a little luck and a good Charisma reaction roll, they might teach a variant form of such spells as Contact Other Plane, Commune with Pentazoid, or Poly-Axial Realignment...but the Pentazoids will demand a grim price for this knowledge...
14. Petrocloptrian: 1d4 hovering telepathic alien beings who wield seven melee weapons at a time using a form of close-quarters telekinesis. They are hunting Bandersnatches and arrogantly disdain having any interactions with humans whom they see as coarse, vulgar and uninteresting. This is probably a good thing though, as the Petrocloptrians tend to hunt anything that they think is interesting in order to mount it upon the walls of their orbital estates. [Petrocloptrian S&W (White Box) stats] [Petrocloptrian Labyrinth Lord stats]
15. Aerial Jellyfish Swarm: 2d100 small but hyper-poisonous gelatinous sacs of living fluid flutter and squirm through the air, each one dangling a multitude of tiny thread-like tendrils that will sting anyone who comes into contact with them for 3d4 damage plus an immediate Save at -2 or suffer terrifying hallucinatory nightmares for 3d6 hours. Lizard-shamen often dance naked in the midst of these things in order to receive visions. Those that don't die are considered profoundly accomplished dreamers.
16. Malevolent Monoliths: 1d4 cyclopean slabs of intricately carved basalt that loom menacingly from their randomly sloping positions within the sand. If the Cuneiform Tablet (2) is present, the Monoliths will awaken and attack everyone in the immediate vicinity, beginning with Rays of Petrification and using Rock to Mud to convert the terrain to a gooey, sticky mess that will hamper their victim's ability to move.
17. Smoldering Lump of Radioactive Glass: Anyone approaching within a mile of this thing begins to make Saves of suffer increasingly negative radiation effects. Eventually a rise in the surrounding landscape will reveal the still-steaming shard of greenish glass sitting prettily at the very center of a crater that could well be over a mile in diameter...
18. Insectoid Cadaver: The scattered and defiled remains of 1d6 dismembered insectoids litter the immediate vicinity. There is a base 50% chance that these are Flytaur Type I Drone-Soldiers. [Flytaur Type I Labyrinth Lord Stats] [Flytaur Type I S&W (White Box) stats]
19. Pernicious Polyp: 1d6 black and tumorous masses of boils, bubbles and larva-like flesh, each one with a different configuration of eyes, mouths, feelers and tentacles circle around the PCs just out of range of any spell or fire-arms they might have. The Polyps will observe the party for 3d4 turns and then either attack in force if the group appears weaker than the Polyps, or else they'll leave. Wait for a day or two. Then circle back and see if luck has changed.
20. See the Writhing Masses & Worse Table.

The Black Ziggurat of Jalamere



One More Sighting of the Infamous Black Ziggurat

Since it was first discovered by players in Blair's Planet Algol campaign early in 2010, the Black Ziggurat has appeared in a number of other games, settings and campaigns across the blog-o-sphere. In his post 'The Blackest Tesserzigguract', the idea of a cross-campaign 'Black Ziggurat' that subtly (and sometimes unsubtly) obtruded into all manner of other settings, planes, dimensions, etc. was further elaborated, to wit: There ought to be dozens of these things out there, all of them highly mysterious, hugely dangerous and potentially interconnected -- that last being subject to GM whim.


So there is a mysterious Black Ziggurat out amid the drifting dunes and harsh wastes of Jalamere. It reeks of preternatural power and pre-dates humanity by millions of years...and it is said by nomads and others who've been unfortunate enough to have encountered the place in their travels that the whole place exudes a miasmic influence that spawns nightmares and worse. Hungry spirits and worse things prowl the broken escarpment that forms a semi-natural wall around the Black Ziggurat.


No one sane goes there. No one sane has ever come back.

There are rumors of terrifying hybridized manticore-medusa creatures nesting in the escarpment near-by the Black Ziggurat, but no survivors have returned with any details as of yet.


No one from the surrounding area will willingly lead anyone to this place, except those of the Wultru and Nirizi tribes, but since those particularly unsavory humanoids are far from trustworthy, it may not be wise to hire their services in this regard...


Black Ziggurat Encounter Tables

• Encounters within a 1 mile radius
• Encounters within a 10 mile radius
• Encounters within a 100 mile radius
• encounters within a 1,000 mile radius
• Encounters at the Black Ziggurat
• Writhing Masses & Worse
• Special Encounters (Black Ziggurat)

Vhonj (Paraversal Plane)

Vhonj is a plane made up of interconnecting strands of filamentous landscapes, predominently scalding hot purplish deserts facing the Jewel-suns and scathingly frigid mountainous regions that are turned outwards into the cold, black void. Each of the myriad of interlocking, interlacing land-strands are tangled around a cluster of hot, jewel-faceted suns. In the deep distance there appear to be other, rival clusters of faceted suns surrounded by their own tangled skeins of terrain.

Map available for download via widget at upper right on sidebar
or at Box: http://www.box.net/shared/8taimbnb6y
This Map is Designated Open Game Content

Vhonj is an old, old place grown bitter and desolate with age and neglect. The days of great empires have come and gone long ago and only scattered ruins, buried tombs and obscure reliquaries remain as monuments and reminders of those who have gone before. Colossal statues and massive idols rear drunkenly out of the hot purple sands of the sunward deserts, each one pitted and eroded into untrue shapes by the erratic caress of the grit-laden winds. On the colder, forlorn and ice-shrouded darkward side of things entire mountains that have been molded and reshaped into strange bas reliefs of incredible scale that few prying eyes have beheld in millennia.

Pilgrims come to Vhonj, and those who prey upon such, as well as those who would protect them for a price. Bandits, grave-robbers and looters of all sorts and types wander the hot sands and frigid wastes of Vhonj looking for abandoned tombs, forgotten crypts, and whatever pickings they might come across--for this is a realm noted for its peculiar, often unforseen opportunities. It is not for nothing that the quadrolophic sages of Palza refer to Vhonj as the ossuary of secrets.

Next Post:

Open Source Terrain, Environmental Effects

& Encounter Tables for Vhonj

20 Major Dungeons/Ruins (Jalamere)

Here's a quick list of 20 sites we want to make sure are included in the final map of Jalamere. So far.

Major Dungeon/Ruin Sites of Jalamere

1. Black Ziggurat (see Black Ziggurat of Jalamere and Black Ziggurat of Jalamere Part Two for more details concerning the immediate area surrounding this strange hyper-dimensional structure)
2. Borderland Keep
3. Brazen Tomb of Gargantua (One of many such entrances)
4. Crash-Site
5. Mysterious Mounds connected by subterranean canals
6. Octagonal Keep
7. Arid plateaus criss-crossed by lines like at Nazca, only for real, sort of...
8. Disangled Ruins
9. Phantasmal City that might not really be there after all
10. Village with strange inter-planar ties to Wermspittle...includes a section of Haunted Hop-Yards
11. Vast labyrinth of catacombs accessed via a dismal sepulchre like the one in The Statement of Randolph Carter by HPL
12. Peak Fortress of the Visitors
13. Crater-Lake within a Black Lagoon
14. Tsan Yian Colony-Dome
15. Escher-site: See Swords & Dorkery's Escher Challenge
16. Cliff-stairs
17. The Dome
18. Gardens of the Resolute Empress
19. Blasted Pyramids of Nitocrimelle
20. Lost City of Jikai

Details to follow...

Spell: Opening The Way

Opening The Way
Level: 2 (some variants are only Level 1, others can be as demanding as Level 7 and above.)
Duration: Typically 5 minutes/per level of caster, with the option to extend duration as usual.
Range: Special

Opening the Way is used to literally create a means of transplanar passage from one location on one particular stratum of reality to another location on another stratum of the paraverse, polyverse, or omniverse--the terminology tends to shift and change according to personal taste and frame of reference.

---

Availability: Common
Provenance/Variants: Myriads of alternate versions available. Most common variant encountered is restricted to one specific Paraversal Plane, Adjacent World, Parallel Realm, etc. Versions exist in nearly all major and most minor spell compendiums. The Wermic Journal of the Transgressive Octavoid,

Requirements & Constraints: Usually none are required, beyond having made the initial connection to the destination by way of a suitable Diagram, Ritual, Skrying, Survey, or other similar means. It is considered a Good Idea to perform some type of divination prior to attempting this spell, so that one can ascertain the suitability and/or desirability of attempting to make this particular transition.

Many of the cheaper and widely available variants of this spell often insist upon a token or focus of some sort to further refine the spell's ability to connect with the designated point of access. The only constraints are those built-into any particular variant, the core version of this spell only requires a designated terminus or destination. Lacking any such coordinate, the spell could conceivably open up an unstable vortex, but such instances are relatively rare.

Favorable Correspondences: Any item previously attuned to the desired destination will enhance the spell's effectiveness and success. There are Transplanar Ephemerides that purport to chart out the favorable/unfavorable times for various sorts of transitions, but these texts require a great deal of expertise in astrological and transplanar mechanics to be of any real use.

---

While this spell may in fact be fairly common in places such as Wermspittle or out among the Wandering Cities of the Kalaramar Drifts, it is not in general circulation among the lesser worlds of the Antechronal Paradiversion nor in those realms caught within the Counterstream of Corporatorium, but with some diligent digging, a few well-placed inquiries and sorcerous bribes, some version or variant will most likely be discovered, eventually.