Recent content by talien

Having just finished watching the first season of Shogun...this makes a lot of sense, actually.

I imagine adventurers self-sort this way, with higher-level adventurers having more wealth due to their success. D&D ends up defaulting to this model where power over life and death is tied to level, and level is tied to people who exercise significant risk (vs. sitting around managing a city)...

Although it makes sense, I was surprised to learn how the defenses were tied to corpse decay. Depending on the season (3 months in the winter, 6 weeks in the summer), undead may come swarming out once the barriers are removed. Conversely, I didn't realize that spellcasters need to see a corpse...

Be it bodysnatching or restless undead, the same tactics apply to keep the dead, dead. Picture of Protected Graves to prevent Grave Robbers by Les Hull, CC BY-SA 2.0, File:Protected Graves to prevent Grave Robbers - geograph.org.uk - 3301588.jpg - Wikimedia Commons Valuable Corpses It’s hard...

I actually photocopied the Sagard maps, blew them up, and then tried to tape them to my existing Greyhawk map. It was a hopeless endeavor (Sagard's adventures are Conan-style "prehistoric" era Greyhawk), but I was convinced I'd stumbled onto some forgotten Greyhawk lore that nobody knew about...

Fun fact, the Sagard the Barbarian books extended out the Greyhawk maps beyond what was published in the box set. This blew my teenage mind when I discovered it: Sagard, Izmer, and Mapping Western Greyhawk

Thread necromancy here but couldn't resist pointing out that if you're looking for ways to visualize the (very brief) description of the above events, check out this series on Hulu: Shōgun (2024 miniseries) - Wikipedia

It took me a bit to understand what happened. They flipped the image on the opposite side. Since Destro is one of the few characters pointing up and to the right, when flipped he's pointing to the left. The cardboard has to accommodate both his pointing right hand and his (on the reverse)...

Me too. For better or worse I'm not sure the property is quite as hot as it was since it moved to HBO Max. I've been watching all the episodes in order with my daughter, but we started with Fiona & Cake, and going back to the original Adventure Time is, tonally, a shock. The show got better...

It's weird how D&D really struggles with dreaming. I suspect it's because the sleep rules have been fuzzy and undefined (and the strange decision to have one species, elves, not actually sleep, and thus make it difficult to ensure a party all dreams together). Dreamscapes, active dreaming...

The intersection of Egypt and dreams is pretty much the Dream Stele, so when I was looking for a graphic it made the most sense. Your link describes it well, but here's an overview with more details: The Dream Stele: How a Dream Changed the Course of Egyptian History

Dreams are not an uncommon trope in fantasy settings, but the first recorded nightmare haunts us to this day. Picture by Carl Richard Lepsius - Denkmaeler aus Aegypten und Aethiopien, Band V, Neues Reich, S. 69, Public Domain, File:Giseh Traumstele (Lepsius) 01.jpg - Wikimedia Commons The...

Wrote my comment without seeing yours. Hard agree.

From a distance I thought this cover was amazing. Up close? The wizard is looking in a completely different direction (did he summon it? is he trying to stop it? unclear). The warrior seems unconcerned that she's about to be pulled into a pit by a monster. I'm not sure if it's how the models...

Oh that's right, the original was a side view (and less clothes).