i kind of just banged out this rough hex-map and some rules which included classes, psionic powers, cybernetic parts for cyborgs, and mutations over the course of a couple of days.
then I got a concussion falling off of a skateboard and got minor memory loss (i'm fine now) which makes all of the themes of dreams, worlds with worlds, unreality, and bio-horror feel extra potent and freaky. life imitates art, i guess. anyway! my friend told me that the world could use an introduction to explain the idea and contextualize the hex-map, which makes a lot of sense because its sort of a confusing mess as it is.
the rules are a science fantasy hack that incorporate mechanics from Knave, Maze Rats, & the GLOG-o-sphere. The world is a post-apocalyptic wasteland split between 4 factions: Star, Ooze, Chrome, and Crystal. These four factions correspond to the color palette for the world and each one can be mined for plot hooks, NPCs, monsters, spells, and weird technology.
the world is probably a little closer to gamma world than a medieval fantasy D&D game, but technology is scarce enough that you'll still find plenty of mud-soaked peasants with swords, the swords will just be made of scrap metal from dead robots.
THE PUNISHING STAR, ??? (NAME UNKNOWN)
A cult formed around the worship of an enigmatic messiah that fell down from the heavens. The Cult of the Punishing Star believes in judgement by radiation.
Their knights are known by their blue armor and hazmat suits painted with one bright yellow star.
THE DREAM OOZE, OOBILEX
A cult worshiping the golden yellow ooze-god Oobilex. The Ooze and its cult enter an astral reality when they dream or submerge themselves in yellow slime.
Their knights are known by their black armor with large glass domes overhead. Inside they are made of ooze.
THE CHROME CYBERLICH, AMDUSIAS
The legions of cybernetically modified skeletons and undead husks follow the Cyberlich. The Cyberlich's followers use cryogenic technology to lie dormant and dreamless for centuries at a time and halt the aging process with cybernetic advancement. The Cult of the Cyberlich has conquered death and offers a new way of life to any who are willing to transform themselves in the image of immortal chrome perfection.
Their knights are known by their skeletal faces, chrome armor and red laser weapons.
THE CRYSTAL ONE, IRIDIUS
Iridescent Crystals can be used to enter a simulated reality. The cult of Iridius believes that the crystal reality is actually the real world and is trying to get everyone to leave this world forever and move on to the utopia that lies within the crystal reality.
Their knights are known by their pink hologram armor and floating crystals.
WHAT IS THE DREAM?
Followers of Oobilex believe in an alternate reality that is only accessible through dreaming or by absorption into special oozes which act as permeable membranous portals into the dream.
WHAT IS CRYSTAL REALITY?
Followers of Iridius use pink crystals to enter a collective simulation-world
HEX KEY:
| X | Y - DESCRIPTION / LANDSCAPE / ENCOUNTER / TRAP / TRICK / TRAVEL / TREASURE / HIDDEN |
|---|---|
| A | 01 - CRYSTAL STALKERS lie in wait for ambush. They are planning to suck a STAR KNIGHT into their simulation crystal and then assassinate or kidnap/ransom them. 02 - Some kind of unidentifiable building made out of massive curved BONE-like material. Perfectly flat shining metal doors can be found if searched but can’t be opened without lasers or other intervention: they are very durable and resistant to most things. 03 - Feral crystal-people stumble across the hills. 04 - A heavily irradiated river flowing through hills laden with crystals. 05 - CRYSTAL CITY. Largely empty. Everyone believes in the next life and are simply waiting to leave. You have no way of knowing for absolute certainty what happens if you enter the massive crystal in the sky. 06 - Irradiated woods, surrounding 3 tiny domes: a village, a derelict hydrofarm, a Star-Fort. 07 - Pink stone cliffs and an irradiated forest valley. Holo-Knights in the Holographic-Fortress on the cliffs skirmish with Star Knights besieging their fortress. 08 - Irradiated swamp, a ruined white bone factory hidden deep inside. Star Knights hunt for mutants in the area. Inside the factory: feral irradiated beasts and a hidden level where a Mutant Radiamancer grows hydroponic vegetables and builds weapons to fight the Star Knights. |
| B | 01 - Dust fields. Cyberdead hide under the ashen-dust. 02 - Domes made out of white BONE and CHROME. Inside, cybernetic zombies with picks for arms mine for precious metals. Parts of the mine have been abandoned to squatters, under-worms, other beasts and troglodytes. 03 - Crack grey clay-fields. A yellowing building sinking into the mire. Inside: an aging Ooze Barbarian lord commands a small but strong group of warriors as they attempt to take back their ancestral home from the cyberdead invaders and Chrome-Knights inside. 04 - A heavily irradiated river flowing through hills laden with crystals. Undead irradiated Star Knights lie in wait under the water. 05 - A heavily irradiated river flowing through hills laden with crystals. A caravan of mutants protected by a Holo-Knight trek along the river across the pink hills. They were recently attacked by Star Knights. They want to trade and exchange information about the area. 06 - Dead City - The only people who can live here are cyberdead, cryosleepers, Radiamancers, Star Knights and ones with gas masks. Its a wretched hive of scum and villainy. 07 - Cyberdead Graveyard. Thousands of abandoned cryosleep chambers. Some sentient undead, others feral. A Cyborg Cryomancer performs experiments in the cold white halls of his fortress. 08 - Cryopod Temple. A sleeper of inconceivable power being studied by cyberlich’s scientists. |
| C | 01 - Bone Fortress. A half-dozen necromancers and 30 augmented corpse-guards. Inside: cyberware, schematics, spelldrives, hi-tech weapons, map data leading to cryopods. 02 - Jagged Glacial crabs. They have massive frozen shells like frosted glass, or icebergs, creeping along thousands of tiny chrome legs. Each one is a mile long. They skitter about very slowly. 03 - An irradiated lake surrounded by crystal sands. A village on the shore. An island in the center of the lake, actually the tip of a dome under the water. Inside: a hidden cloning facility run by Crystal-People. 04 - Slime Pits. Yellow-grass fields full of vast pools of shiny black slime. You can walk across it or sink into it if you try to. Its sort of like Jello. A permeable membrane into tunnels. The tunnels are maze-like and difficult to navigate. You can find 3 things while wandering there: Slugs and Oozelings living in collective homes, A Psychic Under-worm, Star Knight Judges looking for pariahs to slay or convert. 05 - Yellow-fields. Hulking herbivore quadrupedal slime-moose graze lazily over the peaceful petal-grass. An Ooze-Knight shepherd watches them closely and will defend them from any attackers. He is also looking for help stealing from a Warlock in Hex D-07 06 - Punishment Temple. 16 Star-Knights, 1 (secretly agnostic) Astromancer. A part of the building was constructed from derelict spaceship parts and functioning rare machine components are housed deep in its hidden Reliquary. The building is basically a prison full of mutants, slug people, and anyone else who refused conversion but wasn’t killed. 07 - Rocky moors flooded with irradiated rain. Star-Knight Scout troopers patrol the moors hunting for mutants. Mutants are led by a Pyromancer and have a hidden hideout under a rock. They want to break their buddy out of the nearby prison of the Punishment Temple. 08 - Dust fields. A dead Warlock with 2 spell-drives is buried in an grave on top of a hill of white ash under a dead tree. |
| D | 01 - Bone mountains poke out of ancient garbage fields made of shredded plastic and metal. Lair of a freak biomancer. Small new organisms crawl about on uneven numbers of legs devouring trash. 02 - Bone mountains poke out of slime. A family of slugs trek up and down one of the mountains from a burrow near its summit where they are repairing their home after it was recently devastated by attacking Star-Knights. They want revenge and will offer you their ancient ancestral weapons if you psychically promise to use them to slay their foes. 03 - Black Prism Domes poke out of the pink stone mountains. The inside was once a bunker which was compromised and irradiated. The Bunker-Dome has a couple of havens of mutants still living inside it, but it is largely overgrown and infested with feral cyberdead, Star Knights searching for technology and mutants, and feral Cyrogenic dreamers. 04 - Irradiated lake. A fishing village of mutants/peasants heavily policed by the Star-Knights sits along the lake. 05 - Irradiated woods surround a chemical lake where cyberdead are building a cryopod fortress. 06 - A huge chrome-shelled beetle stalks the irradiated jungle. Hidden in the canopy is the suspended hut of a Cyborg Necromancer who controls the beetle. The Star Knights want it dead. The Necromancer wants dead Star Knights. 07 - Slime coats the yellow ground. A Tower on long stilted legs creeps across the muck. A Neuromancer lives inside, 08 - Slime ponds. A sleepy town ruled by a peaceful Somnambulist Ooze. |
| E | 01 - Chrome structures dot the landscape, inside are peasants and mutants who have paid the cyberdead exchange for protection from the Star Knights. 02 - An Astromancer is hiding in a the skull of a dead beast. Cyberdead are all around. At night, portals open in the sky. 03 - Slime Fortress on a bone-mountain. The Fortress is a safe haven and an entrance into the dungeon below which is full of cyberdead, laser-beasts, radiation and elaborate tunnels. 04 - A Holo-Knight treks across the white-bone sand desert looking for the Astromancer who stole his crystal. 05 - More empty streets and houses full of Crystal-People. Holo-Knights protect them. 06 - Pink smoke suffuses the atmosphere in a dome. Star Knights and feral cyberdead are attempting to besiege it. 07 - Temple of Somnambulists on a yellow hill. 08 - Yellow hill. Mutant knights hunt a dream beast which has taken form. |
| F | 01 - A small village near the road in the cold hills. Swirling faintly kaleidoscopic pink smoke covers the empty streets. Everyone in their houses are either dead or in their own personal Crystal Reality. 02 - Star Knights have rigged a set of valuable power crystals to to judge their users and surveil them. If you use one, an ambush will emerge. 03 - Cyberdead harvesting dead crystal-people for organs. A nearby Necromancer sells replacement organs and cybernetics in exchange for memory crystals. 04 - A newly awakened crystal-person is horrified to be out of their simulation and will attack you on sight. It wants to go back or it wants to die. 05 - Island of irradiated jungle surrounded by a desert of white sand. Holo-Rebels hide in the dunes scouting out the Star-Tower on the island. They will pay you for any information and for the head of the brutal Knight who killed their brother. 06 - Bone Towers rising out of pink smoke. 07 - Cracked clay fields. A tower of silence guarded by cyber-vultures. They bring the corpses of cyborgs here and pick them clean to harvest their parts. If you can get past the vultures there’s a trove of multiple cybernetic enhancements, parts and schematics. 08 - Yellow-grass moors. Slime drips onto the landscape from a weird floating chrome warehouse-like building suspended at cloud-level by long metal poles. It’s always night underneath its shadow and the yellow-fields are stalked by slime-devouring vampiric beasts. The cave of the terrifying Obsidian Beetle is burrowed in the side of the warehouse and drips slime. |
| G | 01 - Bone-white plains of stone, feral cyberdead hunt at night. A small hut carved into the ground. Inside: an old cyborg. Will trade his old laser-glaive for some cryo-gas. 03 - Irradiated lake. Cyberdead run boats and drag the lake looking for bodies, fighting the lake-monsters. Under the water there is a sunken vessel with schematics and a random spell drive. 05 - Star-fields. Irradiated, lots of craters and rubble. Hidden: in one crater, a Star-Knight laboratory where they are experimenting on a powerful Psychic. Star-Knights patrol the border. 07 - Slime people in bone buildings. Ooze Fortress. |
inspiration images:
