York isn’t in the Americas. It’s also a former Viking settlement, Jorvik. A millenium later and I’m in the same place, following the same diet of meat and bread.
WilloftheWest
joined 1 year ago
Please give it a spin if you haven’t already. Game mechanics need not be constrained to die roll plus modifier. Probably my favourite mechanic is that your level of aptitude in a skill is repesented by the size of die you roll. Also, Savage worlds were doing rerolls for good roleplay in the form of bennies for a few years before D&D dreamed up advantage and inspiration.
I also love playing a Huckster in Deadlands. The poker hand mechanic to essentially perform wild magic is ridiculously evocative.
I’m really singing its praises here, but I really love the classless edge system of Savage Worlds. I’ve never come up against the problem I have with other RPGs where I have to force the mechanics to fit my concept. Want a plate armoured wizard? 2 edges, playable as a beginner character.
I have started doing that actually. I’ve moved over mainly to Call of Cthulhu, which has very fast and easy combat. I’ve had some great descriptions of combat manoeuvres that net a bonus die.
Someone after my own heart. Say what you’re going to say and I’ll decide the DC. Just say “please” and probably get a straight check DC 12-14. Insult the guard’s mother and children will likely get a DC of at least 15 and maybe disadvantage. Going above and beyond probably doesn’t require a roll and nets you inspiration.
Savage Worlds does this right with wounds. Anything under a great success leaves the character shaken, so that they must save of lose their turn. Every wound is a cumulative -1 on all rolls. 4 wounds and you’re out of the fight.
In the eighth and final chapter of the story, Randolph Carter reaches the end of his quest and the end of his dream.
Carter and his host of ghouls and night-gaunts fly through the night, through darkness and foul winds, with such speed that Carter marvels that they are still within Earth's Dreamlands. As they reach more dizzying heights, Carter sees the three peaks of the quarry stretching out before him and only now realises that they are former mountains, carved in the shape of godly sentinels.
Carter and the ghouls are spooked by some colossal flying creature keeping pace with them. Carter imagines a shantak of epic proportions, but the flying creature appears more like an infinitely magnified head than a bird. As the group clears a mountain range, Carter is driven to madness but utters no scream. The "flying creature" is in fact only the double hyena head of some silently lumbering titan who is following them. Carter looks back to see that the three mountain sculptures have also animated and are silently creeping after the group.
In the endless void, the constellations, while unchanged, begin to reveal their true hidden meaning and geometry to Carter. Carter comes to realise that there is a hidden pattern in the stars which points ever forward to true north. Carter eventually notices that the night-gaunts no longer flap, and that they are borne ever onward on some violent gust.
Pickman utters a command and the night-gaunts rapidly gain height and speed, leaving the mountain sentinels behind. They travel at such hurtling speeds that Carter believes they must have crossed into some new realm of the dreamlands. Suddenly, he sees the peak of Kadath, a mountain for which the impassible range between Leng and Inganok are merely foothills.
Atop the peak is a gargantuan castle, a structure for which the colossal carved onyx from Inganok form building bricks. The host of night-gaunts and ghouls effortly glide abreast through the one lit window. Once inside, Carter struggles to see the boundaries of grand chamber. The winds abruptly cease and the party are deposited on the floor of the chamber. The castle appears otherwise empty.
The group are greeted by a dreadful trumpeting. At the end of this haunting note, Carter realises that his entire retinue has dissolved into thin air and he is alone. A horde of slaves, with chimera-headed wands in one hand and silver trumpets in the other, form a line and play a fanfare announcing a man, the ideal image of a pharaoh.
The pharaoh greets Carter amicably and introduces himself as Nyarlathotep. He apologises for Carter's trouble at the hands of his minions and explains that, if he had not been busy elsewhere, he would have personally escorted Carter to Kadath. The gods of Earth have abandoned their castle atop Kadath and declared that the fantastic city of Carter's dreams shall be their final home.
Lovecraft then, through a monologue of Nyarlathotep, writes a love letter to New England. Nyarlathotep explains that the wondrous city of Carter's dreams is simply a congeries of all the wonders of New England witnessed through the eyes of an infant Carter. Carter's prayers alerted the gods to its existence, and they were so enamoured that they've abandoned their godly duties.
Nyarlathotep pleads for Carter to travel to the city of his dreams in order to persuade the earthly gods to return to Kadath; his reward for this task will be to keep the dream city for his own. He produces a shantak and describes the journey, warning Carter to steer away from the haunting music of the Outer Gods.
Of course, this was all a ruse by Nyarlathotep, who knows that Carter and the shantak will be hypnotised by the music and urged to travel on to Azathoth and inevitable madness. The instructions on how to escape this fate were simply given to torment the helpless Carter.
While travelling to his waiting doom, Carter remembers that he is in fact dreaming. Through a feat of mental strength, he wills himself to jump from the back of the shantak and plummet into the void.
Carter plummets for unknown aeons, witnessing the birth and death of galaxies. He witnesses the new beginning of a new kalpa (Hindu word for a cycle of time. Carter sees the recreation of the universe itself). He continues to plummet as light and darkness are remade. galaxies form and he continues to plummet towards a familiar planet. As he enters Earth's atmosphere, Nyarlathotep races in chase. Just before he can regain Carter, Nodens emits a triumphant noise that allows Carter to escape.
Carter wakes in his familiar bed in Massachusetts and startles awake his black cat. In unknown Kadath, a brooding and foiled Nyarlathotep tortures the gods of earth for catharsis.
This draws the epic of The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath to a close. This is my third time reading it and I'm also a bit shocked at how it abruptly turns into a love letter for New England. other than that, I believe it's a fantastic finish.
The imagery in the final chapter plays into a certain fear of mine. Since I was a child, on foggy nights I've imagined colossal glowing eyes opening in the mist and staring at me. On car journeys I imagined giants chasing after me, stepping between hills as we would step up onto a curb. The imagery of the walking mountains really chills me.
Onto the references, there is the obvious Azathoth. There is also Polaris. This is a connection that I've only made in my latest reading. The dreamer in Polaris is borne away to a new world when he is haunted by the north star shining through his window. From the very first dream story we've seen evidence for how the stars bear secret pathways that transport us, willingly or not, into the world of dream. As Carter travels to Kadath, he witnesses new meaning in the constellations. They appear to be actively leading him further north. I interpret this as the same phenomenon seen in Azathoth, where the dreamer found passage to dream by studying the interconnected voyages of the stars.
In chapter 7, Carter escapes dreadful Leng and comes to the aid of friends.
Carter runs madly through the temple, eventually getting turned around and cursing his lack of direction. He wanders by instinct until after a long while he finds himself outside. He sneaks away from Leng towards some ruins. Safely inside the ruins, he finds twin statues of colossal diorite lions. He recalls mention of these lions as the entry to the abyss via Sarkomand. He wanders but a bit further and hears pained gibbering.
Carter seeks out the source of the gibbering and finds, to his horror, the three ghouls that aided his escape from the abyss, now tortured by the toad-beings from the moon. In a moment of genius, he recalls a password given to him by Pickman. This password allows ghouls to safely travel into and out of the abyss without harassment from night-gaunts.
Carter rushes back to Sarkomand and delves deep, until he feels the familiar tickling sensation of probing night-gaunts. He utters the password and explains his plight. The night-gaunts descend into the abyss and return with an army of ghouls. Carter leads the ghouls in a charge and rescues the three captives from the moon-beasts.
The three captive ghouls describe their journey to Dylath-Leen and their capture. The ghouls caught the attention of a moon slaver crew when they asked about passage to Sarkomand. Ever protective of Leng, one of the slavers pulled the same trick of getting the ghouls drunk on ridiculously strong moon wine. The ghouls were then transported to Leng and tortured for play by the moon-beasts.
The now defeated beasts left their ship behind. Carter and leaders of the ghoul clans discuss a plan to sail to the haunted island and forcefully shut down the operations of the moon-beasts. An epic battle ensues, involving night-gaunts dropping beasts from great heights, and the ghouls defending the captured island from a two-pronged counter assault. The ghouls loot the island for moon alcohol which they can use for trade. Realising that rubies are inedible, they leave the hoard alone. Carter, aware of the origins of the rubies, does not grab any.
Carter, who led a naval counter-offensive during the final great battle of the island, is lauded as a hero by the ghouls and their allied night-gaunts. Carter then sees an opportunity to leverage passage to Kadath. He explains the fear of the gods and shantaks for night-gaunts, and requests a modest reward for his bravery. Carter asks for a few night-gaunts to transport him to Kadath and protect him from assailants. If the ghouls could spare a few of their own, he would also like a retinue.
The ghouls, fearing not what lies atop Kadath, instead over-deliver. The entire ghoul and night-gaunt host will accompany Carter to Kadath, and a company of ghouls shall be his honour guard.
I was surprised that the ghouls were not aware of the night-gaunts' allegiance to Nodens, lord of the abyss. Apparently, everyone except the people of Leng seem to associate them with Nyarlathotep. given their allegiance to the night-gaunts, doesn't it make sense that the ghouls would know of their loyalty to Nodens?
Here we see the foolhardiness of Carter finally paying off. He didn't rescue the ghouls with an idea to bargain for passage to Kadath. He engaged in the (apparently foolish) task of communicating with the night-gaunts, which really could have ended poorly for him. He then led several assaults and was pivotal in the capture of the island of the moon-beasts.
One thing that I don't mention in the plot synopsis is a brass door on the island. It is mentioned almost off-handedly. While the conquerors loot the island, Carter sees a brass door. He has a supernatural aversion to the door and so does not peek behind it. Given what he's witnessed so far on his quest, what could be so disturbing that he dare not bear witness to it?
In chapter 6, Carter ventures to Inganok and the cold desert beyond. There he meets a familiar face and surely his certain doom.
The voyage to Inganok is mostly uneventful. The one event of note is when Carter points out a craggy island and asks of it. The captain says that they have no name for it and do not venture towards it, for strange sounds come from that island at night. They later dock in the amazing carved onyx town of Inganok, where reverence to the old gods and old customs are observed. The town is seemingly filled with carvings similar to that on the mountain Ngranek, though far less impressive.
In town, Carter acts as an onyx miner and asks after quarries. The locals warn of a strange quarry that none venture to, for it was seemingly mined by a strange hand. Carter notes that Kadath is fabled to be made of onyx. While in Inganok he notes a familiar face: a particular merchant he met in Dylath-Leen, who is known to trade with the people of Leng. He trades giant shantak eggs for onyx.
Soon Carter departs for the desert and the giant quarry. He comes to a smaller quarry, where the miners warn him of not venturing further. He ignores them and carries on. Looking back, he is perturbed to see the familiar merchant arriving at the quarry. He ventures ever onward with his hired yak until he reaches the fabled quarry. He is astonished to witness the sheer scale of the quarry. Clearly giants have mined at this quarry. His yak is spooked and runs away. Carter gives chase.
Carter soon realises that the sounds of yak hooves he believed he was chasing are actually coming from behind. He runs on frantically, not wishing to confirm his fears by looking back. Eventually he is struck by a horrific realisation. He is trapped by three colossal carved mountains in the distance. Flying to meet him are elephant sized reptilian Shantak birds. Certain of his doom, he turns to face his pursuer and sees the familiar merchant, atop a yak mount and herding a flock of giant shantaks. The merchant dismounts and forces Carter to mount a shantak. He also mounts and they fly out of the quarry. During their flight, Carter looks down to see huge craters which remind him of the colossal cave on Nganek which led to the abyss. The shantaks fear these holes.
Passing by the impassible mountain range, Carter finds himself at the plateau of Leng. He sees yet more familiar figures, as the hooved and horned men of Leng were in fact the slaves and cattle of the moon toads.
Carter dismounts and is led to the temple in the middle of Leng, where the High Priest Not to be Described resides. In this temple, he gains important knowledge on Leng and its environs. Leng and few other places are home to passages to the abyss and the waking world. The abyss is the dominion of the celtic god Nodens, who uses night-gaunts to his bidding in order to guard these passages to earth. Even the gods fear the night-gaunts. This confirms Carter's suspicion that the nearby craters are similar to that cave on Nganek. The murals also describe the worship of the toad-beings from the moon, and how men of Leng are transported on slave barges to the moon via the island that Carter passed on the way to Inganok.
finally bringing himself to face the High Priest Not to be Described, Carter is horrified to learn its true identity (which is left a mystery to the reader). He tackles a guard and makes his escape.
In this chapter we see references again to Celephaïs and The Strange High House in the Mist. In the latter story, Nodens is one of the gods who arrives to the house to escort dreamers safely on their journeys. It is interesting that he employs a gruesome creature that even gods fear. In Celephaïs we learn that the only other known character to escape the clutches of the High Priest Not to be Described is Kuranes himself.
I'm interested in the imagery of the High Priest. He wears all yellow and covers his face with a yellow silk veil. When I first read this I thought of Hastur, which Lovecraft namedropped in at least one of his stories. Another possibility that I've thought of is that perhaps the people of Leng have some manner of cult to Hastur.
The fifth chapter concerns Randolph Carter making the journey to Celephaïs, asking after the men who bear resemblance to the gods, and setting off on a boat to their lands.
After bidding farewell to the ghouls, Carter wanders through the woods. He hears murmurs of a war between the cats and the zoogs; the latter are enraged by their slaughter by the cats of Ulthar. Understanding the language of both, he finds a group of cats and warns them of the pending attack. Using Carter as a translator, the cats broker a peace deal with the zoogs. His job in the Enchanted Wood done, Carter sets off towards Celephaïs.
On his travels, he discovers that the god-like men come from the cold land of Inganok, where no cat dare tread. The men of Inganok trade in onyx, which they mine and use as a building material. It is revealed that their land neighbours Leng, which is separated from them by an impassible mountain range. Prying further, Carter finds that a stony desert lies between Inganok and the mountain range, a desert so unsettling that even the men of Inganok no longer travel in it despite its rich onyx deposits.
Finally reaching Celephaïs, Carter visits his old friend Kuranes who has lived for many years after his physical death. He has become bored of Dream and models parts of Celephaïs after his earthly homelands in the West Country of South England. After revealing his plan to climb Kadath and entreat the gods, Kuranes follows suit with almost everyone else who has spoken to Carter, and advises against his continued journey. Ignoring the wise king's advice, Carter finds a ship of the men of Inganok and sets sail towards their homeland.
Lovecraft was really having fun with this short story. On a simple quest to find a particular mountain range, our hero has been kidnapped by slavers from the moon, been rescued from moon-toads my cats who can jump to the moon, climbed a dangerous mountain to bear witness to a colossal carving of a god, been kidnapped by night-gaunts, traversed the abyss, snook through a city of ghast-eating giants to regain the surface, and brokered a peace between the cats of earth and dream and the carnivorous zoogs. While there are definitely horrific undertones such as the seeming ever-looming presence of Nyarlathotep, this is definitely more of a tale of classic fantasy than a tale of horror.
I was interested to see how Kuranes had developed over his long years in Dream. I was especially interested in the fact that he had grown weary of near godly power over the city of Celephaïs, and that he is embarking on long journeys to sate his wanderlust.
The story opens with an excerpt attributed to Borellus. Though there are conflicting opinions on the identity of "Borellus", with one Lovecraft scholar suggesting the Italian scientist Giovanni Borelli, the most likely candidate is the French alchemist Pierre Borel. Nevertheless, the quote is misattributed to Borellus. Lovecraft got the quote from Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana. Cotton Mather, a puritan preacher who was a key figure during the Salem Witch Trials, paraphrases Borellus. The quote conjectures a purely scientific method of reviving and contacting the dead, without the need of criminal arts such as necromancy.
Part I is titled A Result and a Prologue. It details the inevitable escape of a patient - Charles Dexter Ward - from a private insane asylum near Providence, RI. The prologue also details the upbringing of the patient which instilled in him a scholarly attitude and a fascination for history. The family doctor ponders on the events leading to Ward's institutionalisation, and believes Ward's insanity to be inextricably linked to his research of a disgraced ancestor and purported necromancer, Joseph Curwen. It appears that efforts have been made to expunge all historical records of the existence of Joseph Curwen.
The prologue does a great job in establishing the premise of the story. A young man with an obsession for colonial history finds evidence of a great grandfather with links to the Salem Witch Trials. In seeking out information of this ancestor, he finds a new obsession in continuing Curwen's work and finds himself haunted by Curwen over one and a half centuries later.
This story's only connected by reference to the Dream Cycle. Though we don't see the direct reference to a Dream Cycle character in the first three parts, there is one sentence from the prologue that interests me. "Here ran innumerable little lanes with leaning, huddled houses of immense antiquity; and fascinated though he was, it was long before he dared to thread their archaic verticality for fear they would turn out a dream or a gateway to unknown terrors." While this can be shrugged off as the fantasies of a child, we have seen from numerous characters of the Dream Cycle this ability to seamlessly find oneself wandering absently from the waking world to the dreaming world simply by wandering down the right (or wrong) path. Though this may just be a childish fear to Ward, there definitely exists the danger of wandering into dream and facing the terrors that reside there; recall from last week the perilous journey of an expert dreamer in The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath.