Faufreluches: The Salvation of Nereus

You are a man out of time. You are yesterday's hero, and tomorrow's. 

You are of the Palace. You are a Paladin.

This is a treatment of Investigating Censor for this blog's Faufreluches setting. Consulting both before proceeding is recommended!

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The Scene

The Nereus system lays spinwards of Mencharo, on the verges of Regency territory. It sits in an odd plane of Curtmantle space, making it slow to access but necessary to pass through. Thirty-four planets, planetoids, and moons orbit a blue-ish but hospitable sun. 

These include...

• Limnoreia, airless seat of a Mews waystation
• Amphinome, where abundant pastures have been seeded under Stadtholder supervision
• Maira, glistening with deadly volcanic activity
• Kymothoe, a planet of vast oceans and swift winds
• Galateia, blanketed in impenetrable cloud
• Amatheia, a moon of grit deserts and grey chasms
• Oreithyia, high-peaked planetoid with an erratic orbit
• Speio, of the fertile caverns

Two Janissariat groups have set claims to these worlds. They are the Díarmuidapur Kin-Brigades and the Neo-Bactrian Peregrines.

The Díarmuidapur Kin-Brigades

The Díarmuidapuri are known as some of the foremost shock infantry in the Regency. Their main advantage is not merely the charge - though this is undeniably ferocious - but that they make their assaults through and in mortar fire from their support column. This is enabled by the short-burst energy-based 'shield umbrellas' that allow for carefully timed near-invulnerability from above. Trust between 'Pipes' and 'Drums' is essential, given the nature of their signature tactic - and they are reshaped by the structures of this Janissariat band to have bonds equal or surpassing the family bond. The desire for mortar-hefting Pipes to become broad-backed Drums covered by the taut cylindrical skein of the shield umbrella also leads to competition, reinforcing that bond in odd ways as Pipes try to both goad on and preserve Drums.

Recruitment 

The Díarmuidapur Kin-Brigades take only volunteers - but do spend their time boasting widely of their deeds and encouraging artwork in their honour. Their reputation is significant in their sector of the galaxy, and it is well-populated enough to provide an ample supply of young hotheads, would-be heroes and thick bastards. It helps that the Kin-Brigades look and act a lot more human that many Janissariat Bands. 

There are a scattering of Díarmuidapuri families, but never quite enough to repopulate their numbers. Former Drums (and invalid Pipes) will drift into assorted administrative roles.

Resources

The Kin-Brigades' characteristic shield units are now difficult to fabricate: force-flow circuit miniaturists are few and circuit miniaturists with access to precision-work machinists and ample resources are even scarcer. So shield umbrellas are passed on from a former Drum (who are never defeated, because when even when broken, they can't be beaten) to a battle-proven Pipe. Shield units are plugged between the shoulder blades of a Drum via spinal nerve-ports, to enable their flexible, nigh-instinctive use. 

Díarmuidapuri mortars are not altogether dissimilar from those used across the Regency by household armies and local defence forces. They are easier to carry and reposition, but the real advantage of a Pipe over any other bombardier is their single-minded practice and training. Kin-Brigades are also more willing to obtain exotic munitions. Pipes will carry compact solid-shot carbines and short, handy combat blades.

Drums are glad in robust armour (largely unpowered - the shield-umbrella requires a bulky power pack already), proof against most small arms fire. A tall helm is common. They typically carry a long two-handed sword, edged with molecule-baffling quasi-sharp Tonsori anomaly shards. Compact 'Saltshaker' hand cannons offer the possibility for harassing fire, clearing rooms and intimidation. 

The Kin-Brigades make use of a variety of muscle enhancements, dietary supplements and synth-sinews, and have a number of trailing surgical clans dedicated to supplying these. They also have access to an impressive array of construction tools and materials

Customs

The Díarmuidapuri encourage plenty to be said about them, and will offer patronage widely. But they have a few specific customs of their own. Firstly, there are lineages of Pipe and Drum that reproduce sensibilities, techniques and personal superstitions from master to apprentice. The term 'Kin-Brigade' often makes outsiders think of these as essentially father and son relationships - but the Díarmuidapuri are sufficiently egalitarian that it is better thought of as elder and younger brother (other than those Pipe and Drum combinations that have a father and son in them...).

Secondly, a Kin-Brigade raises up a feasting house in every even semi-successful campaign. These are towering affairs bearing a variety of stylised geometric forms - lines, diamonds, squares, carefully regular semi-circles. Glazed terracotta is often used, as are neolithiform blocks, along with chrome. Sometimes the local marmoreal will be used for floors or details. Several empty floors and vaults support an upper section that is a banqueting hall with the attitude of a penthouse. When the Kin-Brigade moves on to a new world, the feasting house is left. The vast buildings frequently become storehouses or government departments.

Campaigning

Kin-Brigades generally aim to bring their opponents into a fixed battle. Settlement of the dispute will happen one way or the other and the Kin-Brigade can move on. In the event that they cannot bring an opponent onto the field, they will sweep a region in a series of raids looking to flush their foe into the open. 

The Díarmuidapuri largely aim to enlarge their network of protectorates and obligated nobles and will move quite readily between systems to allow this. They take very little territory but a great deal of supplies and arms.

The Neo-Bactrian Peregrines

The Neo-Bactrians will go about anywhere a human being will go. They will go there carrying more, seeing more and coming back with more. They are also far more likely to survive. Peregrines are nomadic cybernetic warriors bound into mechanical walkers; typically Neo-Bactrian walkers have four legs (with a variety of foot and hoof options), a back bowser for fuel, a central pod for the pilot and an extended forward weapon and sensor mount. 

A world is given into their care for survey work: settlers will serve their needs for a generation - then the Peregrines will move on. If not gathered into a great expedition, Peregrines spend their time moving between settlements on Neo-Bactrian worlds, usually alone. 

Recruitment

The Neo-Bactrians are open to talent, but maintain their numbers largely through a slow but persistent breeding programme. Genetic material can be exchanged, surveyed and assessed at the meeting or two Peregrines. Offspring are deposited with the mobile creche-barracks run by a Secretariat-registered nursery guild. 

Resources

Neo-Bactrians walkers stand higher than the average Regency four-person automobile, but are generally narrower. A variety of hooves allow them to master different terrain. The flexible weapon and sensor mount can be raised and lowered to precise and surprising angles. Walkers are known to be armed with flame projectors, grenade launchers, flechette autorifles and microwave burst guns. 

Neo-Bactrian worlds will have settlements known as Oases (which are probably near a body of water, if not a literal oasis). A peregrine will call at these once a month or so: the helots in this village will provide the Three Types of Fuel, the Six Types of Filter, the Four Types of Projectile and an number of items from the Catalogue of Spare Parts. 

Customs

At an oasis, a Peregrine emerges from their walker. They report on the many miles they have travelled and the various sights around them in careful, objective tones. Peregrines cover their intrusive and extensive cybernetics when out of a walker in cloaks, veils and tight cloth bandages. 

Peregrines are essentially solitary, but will attend occasional moots for decision making and exchanges of goods and information. 

Neo-Bactrians are buried in upright pillar-sarcophagi made from the pods of their walkers. These are topped by an ornate capita carved by a Peregrine in their own lifetime. The wide plains of Neo-Bactrian worlds will often have an isolated and dramatic avenue or geometric web of these sarcophagi. 

Campaigning

Peregrines are gathered for propositions or expeditions by the hereditary functionaries of the Peregrine Delegation. They fight as mobile hordes, striking at will then withdrawing - often at startling speed over all manner of terrain. In the event that they encounter a fixed position, they will besiege it quite patiently.

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The Overture

Ramantai of the Díarmuidapuri has stolen a march on the Neo-Bactrians. Almost literally. Yelain de Lakedt is the Margravial Commissioner over the Star of Nereus, charged with the slow knitting of this border region into the fabric of the Regency and its transformation into a strongpoint against the machine-mind legions and the Empire of P'o L'u.

The Neo-Bactrian Peregrines were called on to survey the numerous planets; this was to give way in time to wider settlement under de Lakedt's oversight and the establishment of the Díarmuidapuri. But the Díarmuidapuri have arrived early. 

Ramantai's Kin-Brigade seized land in lieu of prompt payment from Polyclète, Baron Matamore the on the world of Toranius, which was an as-yet undeveloped holding of the Schematicians. The Baron objected, the Schematicians objected, the Secretariat produced a number of convincing document and the Glossatrices smoothed everything over. The Díarmuidapuri took an immediate payment in supplies and assorted Mint certificates and moved on - but felt they had given way all too easily to the high-handed Matamore. The Baron would admit that he finds the assorted representatives of the Pillars far easier to deal with than Janissariat half-humans. 

This solution was about agreeable to basically everyone on Toranius and nearly tolerable to the Díarmuidapuri. They went to Nereus - and promptly decided that they would not move again. In any event, the Mews carrier flotilla that might have been able to move them was called away by direct order of the Siegneuria, to aid in the excavation of a Stellar Regulatory complex under the eyes of the Pastorate. 

Upon reaching Nereus, the problem of supporting two Janissariat groups quickly became apparent. Hearing rumours that the Díarmuidapuri would be moved on again, Draupadraig, nephew of Ramantai seized Yelain de Lakedt in a desperate raid. It has been put about that she went willingly - and de Lakedt is willing to say as much, not only due to being in Díarmuidapuri hands, but also due to details Draupadraig uncovered of her sale and receipt of prohibited machine-mind designs and formulae. 

The Neo-Bactrians have not taken this lying down, and there have been siezures of Díarmuidapuri assets. Raid and counter-raid have lead to deaths, and more will no doubt follow. An entire star system could be lost from this folly.

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The Cast

But what do you know of this? You only woke up a week ago.

You are a man out of time. You are yesterday's hero, and tomorrow's. You are one of the first psychics. You are a fore-runner of humanity's destiny. You are the bearer of a grave responsibility. You are a great man, and sometimes a good one. You are of the Palace. You are a Paladin.
You have been preserved in the temporal suspension vaults in the Palace of the Massif for the best part of three thousand years, where your mind echoed with the whispers of the Regent and the background murmurs of the College of Martyrs.  

Why did you wake up now? The Regent won't emerge for another three years. He didn't tell you why last time, and he probably won't next time. You've gone along with this for three thousand years, for your own reasons. Another month or so won't hurt.
Everyone knows what a Paladin is. No-one recognises you, so far.
The Martyrs thought you should go to Nereus. They gave you a thick stack of briefings to read en route.

 What were you best known as, Paladin?

1. A Warrior.
2. A Commander.
3. A Ballistician.
4. An Artificer.
5. A Counsellor.
6. A Logistician.
7. An Analyst.
8. A Diplomat.
9. An Orator.
10. A Spy.
11. A Poet.
12. A Survivor.

What characteristic weapon or item do you possess?

1. An antique automatic pistol.
2. A thurible with thought-quickening incense.
3. An advanced mechanical calculator.
4. A spyglass with psychic filament lenses, allowing you to pick out targets with ease.
5. A vademecum of selected law and precedent written in a personal private shorthand by you in ages past. 
6. A hovering rostrum (incorporating dramatic lighting, speaker system, &c) of archaic design, beautifully preserved.
7. A gauntlet incorporating numerous high-precision highly adjustable tools.
8. A banner with the strange device. The strange device is a miniaturised shield projector.
9. A cartographic drone, customised to your own particular needs and sculpted with your own personal heraldry (or by your own personal whim).
10. A suit of armour hardened against every risk of the long-ago war agains the Machine-Minds.
11. A concealable long-range communicator, silenced pistol and survival knife. Tales of your espionage exploits are so well-documented that it is assumed that anyone who has these is you, no matter how improbable that would be. (They are still a pretty good pistol, communicator and knife.)
12. A fold-out box of psychic sand, which shifts according to your whim (while in the box, which can be extended to a metre square).

(The Palace will of course furnish you with numerous other weapons and supplies.)

The Martyrs and the Maiors of the Palace have provided a number of possible assistants for you.

1. A Siegneuria-trained herald, very good at proving that you are who you say you are.
2. A Mint transit conductor, who can find a way to pay for almost anything.
3. A Pastor of the Beacon and Banner Circle, carefully recording everything you do (like it or not)- and with some excellent stories about what you have done.
4. A winning, elegantly dressed Glossatrix. As willing to use existing culture for your benefit as to use you to engineer the culture of the future.
5. The younger son of a Magnate household, with an eye on personal fame to set him above and beyond family repute. He is, alas, unwilling to make use of his family's resources. 
6. A taciturn, near-mute Pyrokine.
7. A Stadtholder Circuitrider: Has gun, will travel. Ability to do things which aren't involved with being a ranger or a marksman is mixed. Probably knows a lot about land use.
8. A Secretariat Full Spectrum Archivist. Can create, utilise, disentangle or disrupt any record-keeping system in Regency space. Has lots of badges that say as much.
9. A Mews Astrothete. Good not just at navigating the stars, but telling people why they have to be navigated in a certain way. A rare diplomat among those of the Mews.
10. A Maioral Pharmacist. Makes just about any drug or medicine you could care to name. Due to the bodily effects of suspension, they work for you and only you: you are the Pharmacist's life's work. Arguably knows your body better than anyone else.
11. A Janissariat Varangist: a hulking bodyguard who is professionally and deliberately foreign. Absolutely incorruptible, really quite lethal, frequently indecipherable. 
12. A Frontiersman. Not remarkably good at anything, but the only person the Palace could find who actually knows the Nereus system personally. The story of why they ended up on Terra is a long and potentially quite thorny story.
13. An Armourer of an unnamed house, who spent fifty years equipping a Magnate's forces to fight a particularly intransigent Janissariat band, only to see the whole thing diplomatically resolved. They are outwardly philosophical about this. 
14. A Mobile Seneschal, perfect for organising quarters, victuals and supplies for an itinerant court - even your bijoux household.
15. One of your descendants. The family line developed quite an interest in you over the centuries. No psychic powers, alas, but really well equipped to deal with what happened the last time you came out of the vaults.
16. A Cryptologist, for the making and breaking of codes and ciphers.
17. A Pastorate officer of the College of Martyrs. Perhaps the only person in the galaxy qualified to be your confidante.
18. An Informer. Really good at blending in where you stand out. Won't tell you where they acquired their skills.
19. A Researcher on the space-faring powers beyond the Regency. Slightly too keen on the Machine-Minds.
20. A Mencherene Defence Force veteran. Knows the fraying social order of the frontier a little too well. Might even know something about the Empire of P'o L'u.

Two or three of these will go in your train to Nereus - where other allies - common or uncommon, virtuous or corrupt, loyal or disloyal - await you. 

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The Places

The inhabited worlds of Nereus fall into three main categories.

• Unaffiliated - where the local Centre of Gravity (or, indeed, centres) may be a regional hetman, a Schematician First-Level Director, a wealthy businessman, an officer of the Margravial Commission, a charismatic Pastor or many other things. An unaffiliated world can still have a Díarmuidapuri or Neo-Bactrian presence. 
• Janissariat-run - firmly controlled either by the Díarmuidapur Kin-Brigades and the Neo-Bactrian Peregrines. The Centre of Gravity will definitely be Janissariat. A Key Personality may be a figure like the Unaffiliated Centres of Gravity mentioned above, but the majority of Key Personalities will be Janissariat.
• Contested - in which case, there are two Janissariat Centres of Gravity in direct conflict, be it open battle or Cold War.

Travel between the world of Nereus is frequent but irregular. There are a variety of craft in a variety of hands that cross between the assorted planets, planetoids, and moons. Getting passage isn't so very hard, given a Paladin's resources and clout - but getting a interplanetary craft of your own will be difficult, and pressing one into your service will not make the owner and/or pilot agreeable.

   Either way, it should take no more than twenty-four hours to find off-world travel as a Paladin.

Travel out-system is only by the permission of the Mews, who exact a fee. While the Mews will have representatives and cotnacts across the System, their centre is the airless moon Limnoreia, where the star-dromonds can rest. The nearest Regency system is Mencharo.

The seat of Yelain de Lakedt was in the high-walled city of Podarsopolis. She is still occasionally seen there, maintaining the vestiges of her legitimacy - but always with a robust Díarmuidapuri escort, and either Ramantai or Draupadraig with her. 

Ramantai and Draupadraig move between Kin-Bridgade holdings frequently: the former to keep the different Díarmuidapuri groups pointed in the same direction, and the latter to keep de Lakedt in his hands (and out of simple boredom).

Meanwhile, Podarsopolis stagnates as the Margravial Commission flounders in the absence of its leader. Plans are deferred, decisions delayed - and funds saved. Any plan to bring peace to Nereus will have to at some point involve de Lakedt, Ramantai and Draupadraig - and, most likely Podarsopolis.

The location of the Peregrine Delegation is as shifting as the Peregine's themselves.

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Other notes:

• This is the long-hinted at Champion Narrative for Faufreluches. As a reminder 'Vorontsov at Bay' was roughly what a Retainer Narrative would be, and 'The Audubonian Breached' is the Scum narrative. 
• Aside from the other inspirations of Faufreluches, part of idea behind this post was 'Jedi Knight parachuted into the Trojan War'. Make of that what you will.
• Obviously, a little more fine-tuning would be needed to bring this to the level of Investigating Censor.

On the Shield of Achilles

You touched the metal disc on the wall, vast and engraved with scenes you couldn't quite make out. There was a flash: the sun, moon and stars wheeled around you, and you saw one or two constellations you think you could name. Then a voice said With it or on it, return to the waves. 

You found yourself in a new and strange place, inhabited by a people speaking an unknown tongue (so unknown, that translation spells fail). Their eyes gleam like mercury. So does their blood. Clearly, you wish to escape this. Perhaps with something in your pocket for your pains....

Roll 1d10 for where you start, re-rolling 10s, then roll 1d6+3 for the number of scenes you must move through.

Transition between areas is a jumble of low, sunken sandy lanes, winding hillside paths and forests. 

1. A city at night: torches gleam as crowds gather for a prominent wedding. The young dance and the old look on.
   Observing at them solemn feasts, the brides from forth their bow’rs
   With torches usher’d through the streets, a world of paramours
   Excited by them; youths and maids in lovely circles danc’d,
   To whom the merry pipe and harp their spritely sounds advanc’d...
   
2. The gathering of a law-court in a city forum. A murder case is being tried, and masses of onlookers and supporters have gathered before the seated judges and bailiffs, with a bounty for correct judgement.
   The heralds made the people peace. The seniors then did bear
   The voiceful heralds’ sceptres, sat within a sacred sphere,
   On polish’d stones, and gave by turns their sentence. In the court
   Two talents’ gold were cast, for him that judg’d in justest sort.
3. Outside a besieged city, a conference is being held between the various factions of the beseigers. Some wish to sack the city entirely, the others are willing to let it be in return for a goodly share of its wealth.
   Two armies glittering in arms, of one confed’racy,
   Besieg’d it; and a parlè had with those within the town.
   Two ways they stood resolv’d; to see the city overthrown,
   Or that the citizens should heap in two parts all their wealth,
   And give them half.
   
4. The besieged city has sent out a picked band, under the head of two gold-skinned siblings to ambush the armies described in 3. They have chosen a careful spot where they will go to water their cattle. Interlopers will be dealt with promptly and desperately. Those supernaturally gifted will see spirits of slaughter and panic and clash gather in ghostly, ghastly anticipation.
   When those in siege before the town so strange an uproar heard,
   Behind, amongst their flocks and herds (being then in council set)
   They then start up, took horse, and soon their subtle enemy met,
   Fought with them on the river’s shore, where both gave mutual blows
   With well-pil’d darts. Amongst them all perverse Contention rose....
   
5. A peaceful scene, where ploughmen are at work - and sustained in their work by ample wine. Careful examination will reveal that the plough uncovers a wonder: gold with the hue of fresh-turned turf. Highly valuable to a collector of curiosities....
   The soil turn’d up behind the plough, all black like earth arose,
   Though forg’d of nothing else but gold, and lay in show as light
   As if it had been plough’d indeed, miraculous to sight.
6. You enter a harvest scene, where a local prince oversees the gathering of wheat. His huscarls prepare an ox for roasting as the harvesters gather in the sheaves.
   His harvest-bailiffs underneath an oak a feast prepar’d
   And having kill’d a mighty ox, stood there to see him shar’d
   Which women for their harvest folks (then come to sup) had dress’d,
   And many white wheat-cakes bestow’d, to make it up a feast.
7. Glittering in the sun is a great jewellers folly: a vineyard, of a kind. Gold vines hang on silver poles in a tin-fenced yard with a moat of glittering blue enamel. Humanoid constructs guard the vineyard against any intruder; their control unit is sculpted in the shape of a boy with a lyre.
   A silver rail ran all along, and round about it flow’d
   An azure moat, and to this guard, a quickset was bestow’d
   Of tin, one only path to all, by which the pressmen came
   In time of vintage...
8. Bovine automata of tin and gold are being escorted by men and dogs through the meadows. Great lions, envious of the gold hides of the oxen prowl after them, hoping to tear one to bits. (If it comes to it, the mastiffs are ineffectual against the lions).
   ...with high rais’d heads, forg’d all
   Of gold and tin, for colour mix’d, and bellowing from their stall
   Rush’d to their pastures at a flood, that echo’d all their throats,
   Exceeding swift, and full of reeds; and all in yellow coats....
9. In a village strug around with sheep pastures, a party is in progress. Armed muscular youths in silver belts dance in a ring with maidens in floral crowns. Two acrobats do something spectacular at the centre of the circle.
   Fresh garlands too, the virgins’ temples crown’d;
   The youths gilt swords wore at their thighs, with silver bawdrics bound.
   Sometimes all wound close in a ring, to which as fast they spun
   As any wheel a turner makes, being tried how it will run,
   While he is set; and out again, as full of speed they wound,
   Not one left fast, or breaking hands. A multitude stood round...
10. A circling, endless sea. Not a cloud or a bird in the sky. Following the line of the beach along only leads to more sea-shore.
    All this he circled in the shield, with pouring round about,
    In all his rage, the Ocean, that it might never out.
    Escape is achieved by hurling a shield into the sea (your own, or one obtained from any of the locales above). This produces a cloud of steam; when it settles, there is the mouth of a cave in the sea. When you walk into it, all lights are extinguished and darkvision blurs. When you are far enough in that you can no longer see the entrance, there is the sound of a single great hammer-blow and you return to your starting location with the disc on the wall - which may now be touched without fear of dimensional travel. 

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• As the title suggests, the inspiration is the Eighteenth Book of The Iliad. Somewhat spur-of-the-moment, and written with reference to the translations of Chapman (see above) and Caroline Alexander. 
• The various scenes suggest a tight selection of social and combat challenges to my mind, though it might be possible to simply sneak through the entire thing. Not quite the action of an Achilles, but perhaps Odysseus would approve.
• It's tempting to place the joined 3. & 4. as the last scene before the sea, but I leave that decision in your hands!
• Presumably, if you dig deep enough in any of the above scenes, everything is made of metal. 

Punth: Ka-Punth Generator

Yoon-Suin inspired a certain amount of Punth: A Primer, notably some of the 'deliberate mystery' regarding the Qryth and their nature and motivations. Following my work reviewing the second edition of Yoon-Suin, it occurred to me that I hadn't applied used the structure of tables in the same way. Punth itself would make for a poor subject for something like the Starting Polity tables for the Hundred Kingdoms: the central regularising element of the Codes rather get in the way. But the fringe tribes of the Ka-Punth might benefit from this. 

Leadership Style

1. Paranoid - the leaders of the tribe are constantly on the look-out for foes within and without, as well as more insidious dangers.
2. Acquisitive - the leaders of the tribe seek more: more territory, more resources, more weapons.
3. Vain - the leaders seek acclaim and flattery.
4. Quietist - the leadership are keenly aware of their relative smallness and seek not to disturb their neighbours.
5. Fanatic - be it grudge, whim, passion, mission or djinn's command, the tribe's leadership have a cause in mind and dedicate themselves wholly to it.
6. Opportunist - the tribe's leadership look to enrich themselves at any opportunity, no matter how slight. 
7. Scholarly - the tribe's leadership seek knowledge: of the Fallen Tower, of the Qryth, of the howling powers of the desert. 
8. Indecisive - these leaders are given to putting off decisions and consulting as many relevant parties as possible.
9. Bloody-handed - the leadership maintain power inside (and project power outside) with spectacular examples of cruelty.
10. Unifier - the leadership seek to pool resources among the Ka-Punth.
11. Scrupulous - the leadership are painstaking about details and proprieties.
12. Client Kings - the leadership owe their rule or prosperity to a foreign power, and will act to benefit that power.

Manner of Rule

1. Shamanic College: An Oligarchy tempered by Fits and Visions - and always open to Talent.
2. Warlord and Comitatus: A Charismatic Warrior and their closest comrades, with succession determined by by impromptu democracy, ritual duals and heavy drinking (or a combination of the above.)
3. Mage-Blooded Lineage: The djinn speak clearest to a particular family line, for reasons of their own. The result is hereditary monarchy, of a kind - with competition for right-hand man status.
4. Kritarchy: Rule by makers of law, precedent and tradition and interpreters of law, precedent and tradition. No-one wants to do something unprecedented around a djinn, or for a djinn to do something unprecedented.
5. Merchant Prince: The tribe is led by a master trader and negotiator who maintains their prosperity in the shifting state of the Punth borderlands. Until they don't.
6. Priest and King: spiritual leadership and temporal power are given to two rulers, who each exercise full authority in their own sphere. The conditions for succession are particular to that sphere.
7. Clan Council: the tribe regularly gathers into a Ka-Punth althing to decide on policy, distribute prizes and determine responsibility.  
8. Daimonocracy: a djinn governs the tribe directly, somehow. 

Relation to Djinn

1. No djinn are in this tribe's orbit.
2. Spirits drift in and out of the tribe's awareness.
3. One particular djinn has made this tribe their own.
4. The tribe maintains careful ties to a number of shades and spirits.
5. Several djinn take a special interest in the tribe.
6. The tribe is fully attached to the djinn as a body.

Characteristic Customs

1. This tribe wear ornate woven sashes to identify themselves.
2. This tribe are 'born in the saddle' and form strong bonds with their mounts.
3. This tribe has an excellent knowledge of Punthite Codes, frequently used for parody.
4. This tribe are known as leaping, twisting, remarkable dancers.
5. This tribe practices ritual scarification; whether or not the scars are displayed depends on the reason and placement of the scar.
6. This tribe are known to use bizarre, difficult to master weapons.
7. This tribe has a vivid and fascinating epic poem detailing an episode in their history committed to memory by some of their members (and often quoted by the rest).
8. Many members of this tribe have a photographic memory.
9. This tribe regards a certain animal as not just symbolic, but positively sacred. If domesticated, they will adorn them and their cages; if wild, they will leave offerings by their lairs.
10. This tribe is either: a. Highly matriarchal, b. Highly patriarchal, c. alternate between a. and b. with the generations or d. Suspiciously egalitarian. 
11. Members of this tribe endure physical hardship and other such trials with great forbearance. 
12. This tribe is widely regarded as cursed.
13. This tribe go veiled at all times, as far as anyone on the outside can tell.
14. This tribe are very keen on falconry. This has very little use in war, but everyone thinks it's pretty cool.
15. This tribe regards raiding as not just a pleasant occupation to be practiced when opportunity presents, but as a way of life.
16. This tribe are staunch Chauvinists.
17. Perhaps as a result of living so near to the followers of the Codes, this tribe are terrifyingly literal.
18. This tribe are known to be forthright and dramatic, and are given to monologuing.
19. This tribe really want to hear about your god or gods and add them to their pantheon.
20. Members of this tribe are known as being insatiably curious.

Size

1. A Company.
2. A Regiment.
3. A Brigade.
4. A Division.

Relationship with the nearest power

(The nearest powers being: Punth, The Nirvanite Empire, the River Kingdoms of the South, the Eight Vales of Marikylo to the east, the Hydraulic Dwarves of the Dividing Mountains and - occasionally - the League of Civic Etiquette from across the sea).

1. The tribe fear and avoid the nearest power.
2. The tribe frequently raid the nearest power.
3. The tribe have been implacable foes of the nearest power for untold generations.
4. The tribe benefit from an unspoken understanding with the nearest power that preserves their lands as a buffer.
5. The tribe are maintain active and profitable relations with the nearest power.
6. The tribe are in a formal alliance with the nearest power.
7. The tribe are being employed as proxies by the nearest power for their own ends.
8. The tribe are being employed as proxies by the nearest power and actively wish to cease this arrangement.
9. The tribe are very eager to gain the protection and resources of the nearest power.
10. The tribe are attempting to draw the nearest power into conflict with their enemies, to maintain their own independence.

Assets

1. A series of concealed cisterns and watering-places.
2. A small stable of successfully tamed and broken Qryth beasts.
3. A number of interpreters who have a well-developed understanding of the speech and script of pre-Qryth Punth.
4. Control of a shady canyon that serves as a meeting-place and trade hub for Ka-Punth tribes.
5. More gold (or other portable wealth) than the tribe knows what to do with, and far more than anyone suspects.
6. A hidden, wondrously fertile valley.
7. Control of an entrance to ruins of the fallen tower.
8. Possession of an ancient Qryth device.
9. A major pilgrimage site (be it for another tribe, many other tribes or a regional power) lies in this tribe's territory.
10. A sect of talented healers and hedge-wizards bolster the tribes capabilities.
11. A group of some of the swiftest and most secret couriers in all Punth.
12. A surprisingly large and extensive library; the tribe's leadership probably know far more about the outside world than they are letting on.

Problems

1. There is broad, popular discontent among the many of the tribe.
2. There is discontent and conspiracy among the tribe's elite.
3. There is strong evidence of a witch among the tribe, cursing them and employing sorcery for their own selfish ends!
4. Disease ravages the tribe (if there are talented healers in the assets above, it's an especially potent plague).
5. Famine or drought ravage the tribe (again, if there is a wondrously fertile valley in the assets above, it is a very bad famine indeed!).
6. A deep-seated feud within the tribe has bubbled into new and fervid life.
7. Infiltration by a regional power or simply another tribe threatens one of the tribe's assets - or the tribe itself.
8. On account of war or depression or disaster, trade through this tribe's territory has slowed.
9. A key resource - arms, mounts, coin, salt, ritual cauldrons - is in dangerously short supply. 
10. There is a power vacuum at the head of this tribe, no obvious successor has yet stood up to direct it and no-one wants to take major decisions until they do.

***

Notes

• Some prompts for this also come from the Khanates and March of Empire tables for The Wicked City.
• As before, Punth has a lot of Near Eastern or Middle Eastern elements that can be whittled down by those using the Primer. This extends to the Ka-Punth. If you want to move away from the obvious Bedouin or Tuareg influences (or, indeed, Fremen - that is, Dagestani...), by all means do. Perhaps Bornu cavalry are an option. Or the Comanche. 

Faufreluches: The World of Menchero

On the borders of the Thousand Day Regency there is a small world - not the smallest - orbiting a distant star - not the most distant - another stout bulwark of mankind's domain - not the stoutest.

Behold Menchero: a world of two billion souls, six major mountain ranges, two vast oceans, extensive wetlands, a bracing copper-scented atmosphere and mild paranoia.

Menchero underwent mild terraforming in the days of the Stellar Regulatory, chosen with the opaque criteria of the Machine-Minds. Settlement by lottery occurred some centuries after the Regent entered his tomb, following survey by a Janissariat expeditionary group. Government was initially by an oligarchy of founding families - who collectively prevented any one lineage from rising, even technically, to the rank of Magnate. Generational debts to Schematician planners, Secretariat licensors and Mews carriers made the world beholden to Pillar influence. This has, however, changed; as in systems spinwards of Menchero settled worlds have been devastated in flesh and spirit.

The government of Menchero is now in the direct gift of the Siegneuria. Talented administrators and leaders from Magnate cadet houses have been placed as governors there for the last century, striving to build up Menchero's resources and resiliency. Native Mencherene stewards watch them come and go, and say that Menchero's care rests with them, as it ever has.

What is it to visit Menchero? Set down at the Benxhan cosmodrome; drive out into the depths of Benxhan Rural, or weave your way into Benxhan Civic. On either journey your passage will be noted by the Vigiles, in their dull green uniforms.  Benxhan Civic will show you buildings clad in the local marmoreal, with its distinctive indigo veins. Members of the Gubernatorial Brigade patrol the Topaz Processional, clad in chrome helmets and brocade sashes. Their banners and motor-carriages show the mulberry and white-gold livery of the Lord Governor. Looking past them, one sees the terminus of the Processional, at the Chrysogonian Hall. Beyond this are the shrine towers of Celb. Drusus and Celb. Famke, with their exconjuratory corner pagodas.  Then the aggressively drab walls of the Continental Academy, and the standard-issue ornamental panels on the barbican of the Office of Public Tranquility. Further out? The Herbgarden Quarter, named for the self-satisfied financial street of Mint Row. 

Perhaps you went to Benxhan Rurual. Once past the marshalling yards and warehouses of the cosmodrome's long brownfield shadow, there are the wetlands and the scattered farm outposts. It doesn't all go one way - mostly, the goods that leave Menchero are canvas, ball-bearings, detergents and canned fish.

Menchero is (approximately) self-sustaining, and has been for some time - but the works programmes of successive governors increase the burdens on most. This is borne stolidly. There has been turmoil in Quoningen Civic as the result of a corruption trial - something to do with railway procurement, they say.  In the hills of Xianwijk Rural there has been strife, and religious turmoil: a dispute over the status of a local holy figure and her placement in the 'Anointed Generations'.  You may see convoys of the Mencharene Defence Force heading west that way, the 1st Security Division visible in buff tunics and oxblood webbing.

This is not the threat that most excites the attention of the governor, however. In the closer-than-comfortable outer galaxy, the foes of man gather. Machine-minds and rogue Janissaries are only part of the picture: rumours and psychic whisperings accumulate of the Empire of P'o L'u. Lords of the Regency begin efforts, subtle or gross, to uncover and repel the Cephalopodic Process and the dreadful absorption into that murky and lurid combine.

Will Menchero be prepared for the great trial when it comes? Which light of human settlement will be snuffed next? What could draw the tentacles of P'o L'u to this little world?

+++

Some persons

Brigadier Sebastian Kemecut - heads the First Security Division. Born and raised in Xianwijk.

Twice-Honoured Volcxken Bohelok - an official, and the most senior Mancherene native official within the Lord Governor's staff. A surprisingly keen historian.

Ioess Hanggata - Chief of the Benxhan Civic Vigiles. Increasingly convinced that he should retire soon, and very keen to obtain funds to enable this.

The Venerable Jorinde Saharca - Arch-Pastor of Benxhan. She belongs to the Echoing Circle of the Pastorate, who have a reputation for gnomic utterances, ascetic sensibilities and remarkable success with the stranger type of psychic. Saharca has been known to treat worldliness as a switch that may be flicked on and off - a habit that sits ill with more than a few of her underlings, especially those more worldly than her. 

Klaas Ergonote - Chair of the Second Directorate, Office of Public Tranquility. He is half-convinced that he could succeed on another world of the Regency, and that his talents are needed elsewhere.

Bombastimaches Greatorex - Lieutenant Governor, a Siegneuria appointment. Can't wait to return to Saiph, and spends a lot of time with the Glossatrices in the Herbgarden Quarter.

+++

Other notes

• Manchero's emblem is a mountain with a long-feathered bird perching on it, between two white blossoming branches. The governor's own symbol (usually an obvious variant of his or her Magnate family's) can be displayed below in a small cartouche. 
• This started life as a piece of 40k material; perhaps the greater military element shows. A world like Menchero is by no means the norm in the Regency, but such places do exist.
• The emperor of P'o L'u is nameless and infinite. His marshals will happily tell you as much.
• Further Faufreluches material (which you may in fact wish to read first...) may be found here. 

Another Return to Yoon-Suin

Yoon-Suin has a second edition. I chose to do a little retrospective work when this news was announced, as you may see here. Now the new edition has arrived, something comparable is in order.

The new edition is, like the shell of a superior Crab-Man fighter, thicker, harder and glossier. There is more content in it, as the initial Kickstarter page made clear - largely in the form of new appendices (including Weapons, Treasure Tables and Collectors of Rarities) and twelve mapped adventure sites. However, the bulk of the text is the same - Opium Plantations, Elephant Shrines, Psionic Gharials and all. 

So, we turn to differences in presentation. An obvious distinction is the artwork. The watercolour-like wavering lines of Matthew Adams have been replaced by harder, somewhat pixellated artwork...by Matt Adams. This is consistently inconsistent, if you will. The artwork of Y-S1 didn't make the book: it was secondary to the table and materials inside in a way that isn't the case in a way that - say - wasn't true of something like a Warhammer Codex. I feel about the same way with the artwork of Y-S2. It doesn't get in the way, and nor should it: if each version of the Purple Land generated by a user is meant to be unique, then setting this in stone with definitive, intrusive artwork will rather get in the way of that. Generated is a curiously appropriate word. The illustrations make me think of something that a long-forgotten video game might have produced - and there are touches that make me think back to MS Paint as lovingly provided by Windows 98. There is one piece - towards the end of the chapter on the Hundred Kingdoms - that stands out in a bad way (not ugly, just out of place). None of it feels like it could exist in the Yellow City itself, which (curiously) helps maintain that degree of separation. 

(Real Yellow-City art would have to be so much more vivid and densely detailed; a sort of Rococo characterised by abundant, even excessive, use of one or two materials - and almost certainly with some kind of patina or wear. Some of the interior maps approach this.)  

Far better about setting the scene or establishing tone are the adventure sites at the end. These take on a number of forms - bounded or open-ended, above ground or as part of a dungeon - and are intended for different regions. Each seems to have a tantalising mix of the social and the violent, which makes excellent sense for Yoon-Suin's blend of cruelty and opulence. There's also some effort being made to make sure they all feel like different places, with a different set of physical challenges and distinct terrains. In several, the weather feels like it could prove as great a threat as anything else. The Mad Sorceress's Blessed Retreat hooks best in my mind. 

What's also worth commenting on is the new form of the tables. In place of the curving sans-serif font and alternating grey-and-white tables rows is something sharper, somehow more vertical. It's not always as direct, to my eye - but the tables work in about the same fashion as before. 

Perhaps the most interesting thing that I've picked up from dipping back into Yoon-Suin is how I find myself diverging from it. I certainly still admire it, and the structure and restraint it shows were very useful in conceiving some aspects of Punth. But I find that what I've worked on or written or conceived recently tends to have some strong central pillars of a culture or an intellectual system or something of that kind to be played with. This put me sort of at odds with Y-S2 on reading it. Where are the Slug-man lawmakers? The great philosophers and prophets? The conquerors and kingmakers? Even resisting the urge of great man theories of history, movements have figureheads and exemplars. Would I try to work the Purple Land's own home-grown amethyst Napoleon into full realisation? Perhaps not, but I might be tempted to build a pantheon or a set of dynasties or to build resemblances between groups in the interests of knitting all things together. 

Of course, this bodes well for play. Can one group pull together the scattered threads of the Purple Land? Knit together magic and statecraft and courage to produce an enduring legacy? One might say that the Yellow City and the great God River have seen an thousand such before, and seen their every statue crumble. If so, then we will be the thousand and first, and none the more ashamed for it. 

Appendices N

A number of blogs have been putting out Appendix N posts as part of a bandwagon. I'm not going to do so - in part because I already have two. 

• The first is for Punth: A Primer and may be found here. 
• The second is for The Rest of All Possible Worlds and may be found here.

In similar vein, my 250th Anniversary post also has a certain resemblance to an Appendix N in its long list of media discussed here.

If anyone really was waiting with bated breath for my entry...here it is. More interesting things are on their way!

July-August Miscellany 2025: France, Alabama, Estar, Little Gidding and the High Dreaming Citadel

The Heptameron, Marguerite of Navarre

Marguerite, from a drawing held at the Bibiotheque Nationale.

A sixteenth century collection of tales, written by a French princess and published after her death in one form or the other. Over seven days - Hepta/Emera - a collection of French nobles stranded by floods in a monastery tell each other tales. The Heptameron was unfinished on Marguerite's death: it was meant to last ten days - as Boccaccio's Decameron - and features ten storytellers. The Anglophone reader will automatically look to Chaucer, but there are a few essential differences. The storytellers are not travelling, there is no landlord of The Tabard to issue prizes and corral pilgrims (one of the French nobles is older and a sort of first among equals, but it's not the same), the story tellers are all of the same social rank (unlike Chaucer's mix: Knight, Reeve, Miller, Prioress, Cook, Pardoner...) and all the stories are of love and lust. 

It's also worth noting that all ten storytellers tell tales on each day. These run from two to fifteen pages long in a Penguin paperback edition (there is a version on Project Gutenberg), so they don't outstay their welcome. Each story is dissected and discussed by the listeners afterwards, and we get a growing sense of their characters - from the stories they tell, from how they react to the stories of others, from the rivalries and alliances made over the seven days. There are five men and five women among them. The ladies are Parlamente, Oisille, Longarine, Ennasuitte and Nomerfide; the gentlemen Hircan, Geburon, Simontault, Dagoucin and Saffredent. Some of them appear to be virtuous or vicious souls from the beginning - but all of them reveal something slightly further by being pushed and prodded by the exchange of ideas. High ideals begin to look a little shabby, or (eventually) naïve. Cynicism is revealed to be at least consistent and resolute, even when to a character's detriment. For characters who aren't actually doing much, they reveal a fair amount of themselves.

As for the stories themselves, they are a mix. There are tragic affairs, bedroom farces - and tales of adultery and betrayal. The sensibilities of the Early Modern reveal themselves, and interactions range from true love to seduction to coercion to deception to outright rape. Friars are especial targets for scorn and are held up as perilous to be around women. It's tempting to put this down to the Reformation - which Marguerite was around to see and take part in - but I would avoid doing so: firstly, because it is only Marguerite's daughter Jeanne III who becomes a Calvinist (and gives us Henri IV, who knows what Paris is worth) and secondly because the Decameron and Canterbury Tales alike have their share of less-than-pious monks, despite being a century or so before Luther. 

More vital are the clashes between male and female virtue - between the urge for conquest and the desire for purity - and all the consequences this has for devout Christians. The behaviour of monks is distressing because of the stated ideals of monks. Jacques Barzun's opinion is stated in From Dawn to Decadence.

It has been called "a masterwork of pornography" and it is certainly erotic: all are stories about the tricks and turns of love affairs, mostly illicit, But the porn-monger of today would look in vain for the physical exploits that have become commonplace in high and low fiction.

...her stories praise in all sincerity love and chastity. ... Toward the end of [the Heptameron] she verges on a sombre naturalism in which love is still a force but the erotic disappears. 

I suspect I would tell most people to read Chaucer first, but this is certainly something to pick through - especially if you like the ideas of the storytellers slowly revealing more of themselves. If you are after more information - or just comparing the jottings of a random blog with another source - then I would look to French Wikipedia before English. (Or just go to In Our Time.)

***

The Adventures of Telemachus, François Fénelon (as translated by Tobias Smollett)

A 1699 work of fiction about Bronze Age Greeks translated by an Englishman in 1776.

Telemachus, you may remember, is the son of Odysseus. He's a young man in the Odyssey, with a kingdom to save and a father to find. His teacher was Mentor - and yes, that does appear to be the origin of the word.

François Fénelon was, among other things, Archbishop of Cambrai and tutor to the Duc de Bourgogne. He had been made the latter rather unexpectedly by Louis XIV - for he had manifested Jansenist and Quietist sympathies for a good chunk of his career. As part of the young Duke's education he wrote The Adventures of Telemachus (hereafter Télémaque to distinguish character and book). This fits neatly into the gaps of the Odyssey, and shows Telemachus on several journey (Crete, Cyprus, Tyre, Egypt, southern Italy) seeking his father - in the company of Mentor, who is in fact Athena in disguise. Telemachus assists in several campaigns, is frequently praised, is taken as a slave, condescended to by Egyptians, rejects vice and learns many important lessons. 

Télémaque is unashamedly didactic. This is part of the appeal: it is being very obvious indeed about what it wants you to think. Even considering Smollett's translation work, this drips of the Baroque. The leafy Sylvan settings, the long speeches, the Classical figures put to Christian moralising - it feels like every chapter could be painted on a palace ceiling. Of course, this probably doesn't recommend itself much to a modern audience as literature. The 'first novel' is one of those things that can be debated to death, but this feels oddly unlike a novel for something written after Don Quixote. 

It's also worth noting that Télémaque was remarkable popular, in part for how often Mentor goes on about the need for a King to make firm allies, not embark on wars of conquest, heed advisors and be faithful to his wife. Barzun (again!) refers to the 

'picture of the government [Fénelon] thought France should have: a limited monarchy with a written constitution, representative assemblies, and a strong aristocracy discharging important duties. There should be equality before the law, public education, the mutual independence of church and state: the liberation of agriculture and trade from oppressive burdens.'

He also mentions that 'Télémaque is a classic, which until lately French children made to read.' One can see why: it's a perfect work for introducing the period, it's apparently quite good French prose, there's a good obvious story of the author managing to vex the king, and the lessons Fénelon imparts probably fit quite well with a vision of French Republican virtue. 

Should you read this if you are not one of the (presumably very many) French schoolchildren that read this blog? If you are interested in the period, you might care to read a few chapters. It fits well with the Rest of All Possible Worlds.  However, this may be a work more of France than of 'the Republic of Letters'. 

***

Crimson Tide (1995, dir. Tony Scott)

Rewatched after many years, having first caught it on my grandmother's television. Turns out I remember it pretty well!

Anyway, it's a submarine drama. Have they received the orders to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike, or haven't they? Aboard the USS Alabama, Gene Hackman ('Captain Frank Ramsey') and Denzel Washington (his XO, 'Lt. Cmdr. Ron Hunter') will dispute this fact.

This uses the enclosed spaces and social structures of military life really well. The repetition of the missile drill scenes and the confirmations of codes works to lay out the mechanics and areas where tension can build. The fact that all the officers have to mess together regardless of how much they like one another helps; that everyone shuts up while Gene Hackman is talking - even just socially - helps. 

Gene Hackman's quite fun in this. As a rare combat veteran in the US Navy of the 1990s (no idea how true that is to life) he's apparently given a lot of leeway by his commanders, and is so is given a fairly free, ungrudging obedience by his men. He smiles, he carries a little dog around, he spouts bombast and knows he's spouting it - he grins crookedly in Denzel Washington's face. He's no Bligh or Queeg, but clearly he's not so many inches from a tinpot tyrant. But more to the point, he thinks that he needs to be - baiting and drawing on his XO in conversation, testing the line in order to reinforce it. Hackman could feel on the verge of caricature, but it's more a matter of a man twisting ever more and more to fit his chosen social niche.

It makes him a good foil for Washington, and (to some degree) a more interesting person than pillar of morality Ron Hunter. Fragments of Tarantino's comic book trivia in his dialogue only goes so far. 

***

Worldbuilding & Woolgathering and
The Wizards & the Warriors (1986) and 
The Wordsmiths & the Warguild (1987)

I recall the names of Hugh Cook's series from the back pages of other Corgi Paperbacks. The W__ & W___ format of the titles probably made me roll my eyes a bit even then, but I can vaguely recall wondering what a Weaponmaster would be, and how a coherent work of fiction with twenty protagonists could (The Wormlord, the Wazir, the Weaponmaster....) could reliably function. As far as I know, there was no conscious influence on the name of this blog (the above subtitle was irresistible).

Anyway, in the wake of the False Machine two-part review of all ten of the Chronicles of an Age of Darkness - and with a lucky second-hand find - I elected to record some thoughts on the first two, The Wizards & the Warriors (1986) and The Wordsmiths & the Warguild (1987).

For those after a fairly quick introduction to the series, I could do worse than point you towards these two summaries with a smattering of comment by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

>>LANGUAGE AND LAUGHTER

Wizards... feels like the most familiar territory. Evil wizard steals dangerous mystical artefact, good wizards and assorted fighters pursue him. The book starts fairly abruptly, with brief profiles of the main characters in the first few chapters to bring you up to speed. There are ancient wizards with significant powers, mystically named orders, castles vaster than even the Romantic dreams of the 19th century could produce, lots of slightly baggy detail about trade languages and nations. It feels a lot like you're stepping into any instance of Tolkien-imitating material from the late 20th century. (The second paragraph on Wikipedia denies that the Chronicles are High Fantasy; true enough, but they pretty clearly want to be taken for it initially - although I stop short of calling them parody or satire). 

I think this is to some degree deliberate. First, because Cook wanted to sell fantasy novels in the 1980s - and we have his own account that Wordsmiths... at least was written at the request of the publishers. Second, he probably quite liked coming up with words and deploying them in long flowing passages - or indeed, short ones. (The sun, naturally, says "Zaan." Injured legs go Balder-shalder-tok.) Third, there are these long passages of trade goods or instruments or what have you which keep knocking you off balance and away from any assumption that this is your world.

Fourth, he's being comic. This passage is from Wordsmiths...; it is situated at a party with young lovers, which is a fairly traditional topic for comedies. 

...the music escalated to a stormburst crescendo. A thrum began to gallop, a kloo honked harshly, a krympol crashed and scattered, a skittling nook began to campaign against the skavamareen and a plea whistle hooted. 

This sounds silly, and invites us to laugh - softly - at the young couple and the situation around them.  

Fifth, Cook knew he was walking into stereotypical waters (if the above passage was in a Star Trek novelisation, you wouldn't blink. If it was in a parody of a fantasy novel, you wouldn't blink). This XKCD comic sums up the attitude.

Cook obviously never saw that, but I think he would have recognised the view, and elected to just walk right through it. This is weird and offputting and you should feel weird here.  This aside from the constant narrator - Chronicler - who might well be willing to just use terminology you have no familiarity with. 

[From that same page of Wordsmiths...

"Don't laugh, gamos,' said the old man, naming Day with the Galish word for a female horse, which was unpardonably vulgar.

Clumsy? Deliberately so?]

>>TOO MANY COOKS

After finishing Wizards.... something crept into my mind from 1984. The Black Company, a dark fantasy series by the American author Glen Cook. I've seen it called or associated with the beginnings of Grimdark; I've only read the first book (The Black Company). A mercenary unit takes on service for a dark empire, that feels quite Mordor-ish (minus orcs-proper, but with plenty of Nazgul types). They are a fairly brutal and unpleasant lot, but there's a vein of loyalty and camaraderie - especially against the internal politicking of the empire that leavens this. The glimpses of ruthlessness by the resistance against them complicates matters further. It is occasionally observed at this point that Glen Cook was a veteran of the Vietnam War.

Anyway, Wizards... felt bleaker than The Black Company - or, rather, as bleak as I expected The Black Company to be. I think this is largely because everyone hates each other. That's a slight exaggeration, but are introduced in the first few chapters to to a wizarding master and apprentice who hate each other and a pair of warriors who hate the Prince they serve and are becoming increasingly caustic to one another. Memorable later is the sheep-rearing father who takes in his sons (a priest whose temple has been burnt down and a mercenary). He shelters them and feeds them, but really thinks very little indeed of them, and isn't shy of showing it.

Even the humble, practical wizard Miphon presumably spends the first half of Wizards... really frustrated with his magical colleagues (and knows that he can't fulfil the mission without them - he might not be frustrated by his own powerlessness to a point of mania, but it isn't a comfortable state of affairs. The Miphon who helps win the day is a different man to the Miphon of the first half-dozen chapters). The hunter Blackwood may love his wife Mystrel dearly, but hates his rulers and is horrified by the warriors around him. 

This changes slowly by the end - after much death, and harrowing journeys, and war. 

>>BRITISHISMS

There are at least two on-the-nose (at least, on my nose) T.S. Eliot references in Wizards... and Wordsmiths... . Mystrel, wife of Blackwood comes from Little Gidding. At one point in Wordsmiths... the thunder says 'Gronnammadammadamyata', almost as in The Waste Land.

There is a reference to Ashmolean jade being traded on the Salt Road in Wizards.... . A character in Wordsmiths... is named Cromarty. There is a city called Runcorn. This sort of thing apparently doesn't stop (click the following link if you are unfamiliar with Liverpool). 

Hugh Cook spent his first few years in England, but soon went to live around the Pacific - where he seems to have spent most of the rest of his live, living in Kiribati, New Zealand and Japan. What are we to make of these uses of British place names? Not too much, I think. The Little Gidding thing certainly doesn't apply that much thematically. I would just observe it as on of Cook's peculiarities.

>>WORDSMITHS GONE BEFORE

Wordsmiths.... traces the bumbling, occasionally heroic journey of the young man Togura Poulaan, son of the leader of the Warguild. A series of events leads to him losing his young love and being thrown into a quest on behalf of the Wordsmiths, who have a mysterious and highly unpredictable device of the ancient world that responds to language. 

Togura goes through any number of distressing events, sometimes intersecting with the plot of Wizards..... until he returns home, to meet with further shocks and misadventures. The whole narrative, with the rube of a protagonist, manipulative scholars, unyielding patriarchs and episodes in remote communities feels rather like Jack Vance's Dying Earth in places - though Togura is a more charming prospect than Cugel ever was. Voltaire's Candide is probably another great comparison, though there's no real Pangloss equivalent. 

[There is a passage attacking a certain flavour of anthropology that Voltaire might well back, of course.]

Though there are other influences. The image of a petty king obsessed by breeding pigs and his obese, terrifyingly strong daughter with her vast appetites might come right out of Rabelais. Though if it were ever accurately put to screen, it would only bring to mind South Park. (Conceivably, Pasolini in full-bore Decameron mode could also successfully portray it).

There's also a few lines of pure bureaucratic legalese that might have come out of any number of British comedies - and contrast the squalor of the town with the political ambitions of its rulers. The line about 'a special tax on Barons' might have come out of the mouth of an Oliver Postgate character. 

As you may have gathered, there's something frothier and lighter in Wordsmiths... than Wizards.... (with some notable exceptions - the cult in the ruined city, for instance). I certainly read it quicker.  

>>AM I GOING TO CONTINUE WITH COOK?

Well, I think I'd like to read The Women and the Warlords as Cook's planned second book. I would definitely like to read The Worshippers and the Way for comparison purposes with Punth. But that may take a while. 

***

Last year I reviewed and praised Dave Greggs's Investigating Censor. There is a new edition - the 'Steppe Cataphract Edition' available (hot off the digital presses!) on Itch.io. This incorporates some of the extra adventures he wrote after the first edition, as well as acknowledging my review work and feedback. If you think this makes anything I write on the subject now tainted by proximity......well, maybe, but that's been the case since I wrote The Cape of Four Pleasances (which I ought to compile into a PDF sometime soon).

Anyway, there's also a new adventure, titled Impermanence. 

This is a useful new adventure - largely, I should say because it offers an example of a different tone. The opulent splendour and violence of general IC fades a bit into the background in Impermanence. Indeed, there's an extent to which it feels more - well - hardcore. 

The Investigating Censors are deployed to a section of the coast called the Fringe of Moments. They are given a sumptuous welcome, intended to deploy them against the current rulers' enemies. There's an element of paranoia that develops from this, with not only hidden (and distressing) Ultracarcerist dens, but also human-puppeteering parasites. (Perhaps I've been thinking too much on Alien.) Environmental touches - like a silk palace suspended over a pitch-black mysterious chasm - add to this. 

Certain elements - as the parasites and the chasm - are carefully left unexplained. There's a predicted order of events (which is very carefully not a railroad) which laves out any dead ends or potential backwater encounters - but that's easy enough to pull together from the base game. 

In any case, the atmosphere and imagery, especially the Jade Sword Saint and the Cargo Labyrinth, work beautifully. There's a sense that even the supernatural powers on your side, or that oppose the Cult of Protection, won't quite heal the Fringe of Moments. It may even harm. (There's some slight alteration to the details of the High Dreaming Citadel that helps this.) This brings to mind - in a good way - Qelong. 

***

Garamondia have just put out an index after 150 posts. It's quite a collection for a little over a year's work and an excellent place to start an archive binge.

Cold War, Fever Dreams

The looming, biomechanical, Freudian image of the Alien franchise may not immediately hint at the Cold War. Certainly, the first few films were made during the 1970s and 1980s, but there's not much in them immediately about the NATO-Soviet clash. Weyland-Yutani might be part of the military industrial complex, but there's little enough that would demonstrate that in Alien. Aliens shows us the Colonial Marines, with all their Vietnam-era looseness of discipline, wildness of manner and military overconfidence, though that's in some ways quite partial. Where we really get a Cold War image is in the un-produced material by William Gibson for Alien 3; this situates the United Americas against the Union of Progressive Peoples (the Soviet Union, Germany, China, Vietnam). Gibson's screenplay is even set in a pair of space stations facing one another along a boundary line. The UPP have continued to crop up in wider Alien material since. So, a Greater US of A and a re-jigged Second World with a patched Sino-Soviet split. All sensical enough, given how Alien has an aesthetic and sensibility continually with one foot in the 70s and 80s. 

But I'm missing something here. Something stranger. In the material of the very first film, we have mention of a 'Three World Empire'. Ron Cobb's notes suggest this as something like a stage of Britain's spacefaring development. One notes the mix of British and American cast in Alien - which was filmed in Britain.
Later material indicates that the Three World Empire is a merging of Japan and Britain (along with a number of Commonwealth and South-East Asian countries). 

In some ways, this is sort of silly. Taking the Weyland-Yutani merger - a name derived from Leyland (the British car company) and a neighbour of Cobb's** - and having the political sphere mirror the commercial. It's a little too close to really convince, without some greater form of detail.***

And yet...the name, with the faintly occult overtones. The Union Flag three-sided vortex, which hints at the British Leyland symbol. The presence of a junior partner in the West of this new Cold War. The fish-hook nerd-bait of 'Okay, but how does this actually work?' I can't help feeling that this should be more interesting to people than it is. There should be fan-art and Woyjak material galore. As it is....well, this is it. 

I have to wonder what more could be done with this 70s-echoing Anglo-Japanese culture and economy. Butskellism on a diet of Bushido, courtesy of the MITI? Morning suits for statesmen imported back to Westminster from the National Diet? Consumer electronics and integrated circuits for both the Atlantic and Pacific? An Anglo-Japanese Concorde? James Clavell was Australian-born: perhaps there would be a BBC version of Shogun; or, indeed, Tai-Pan (would Hong Kong continue to be a flashpoint?). You may debate for yourselves the image of Milton Keynes with Zen gardens. 

***

The real time strategy game Red Alert 2, by contrast, is very much embossed with the Cold War. A branch of the Command and Conquer games, Red Alert (which I never played) supposed a removal of Hitler via time-travel and Stalin attempting a conquest of Europe in his place. Red Alert 2 (RA2) had a rejuvenated Soviet Union try again, with an invasion of the United States. 

So far, so Red Dawn. The main thing to discuss is tone (you can look up a more general review elsewhere). Both Allies and Soviets find themselves developing assorted implausible weaponry: Tesla coils, devastating zeppelins, laser tanks, invulnerability courtesy of the 'Iron Curtain', mind controlled giant squid countered by specially trained dolphins, assorted psychic abilities. There was some of this in Red Alert, but far more in RA2. The bigger difference is tone. Red Alert is (by reputation) far more serious. To my mind, this is only mostly true. My goggles tonight are rose-tinted, but there's a few elements of presentation that skew RA2 away from the full-blown cartoonishness of Red Alert 3.**** 

Both Red Alert and RA2 have the live-action cutscenes that are a C&C mainstay, though RA2's, being a few years later, are rather more polished. The characters are more often stereotypes than caricatures. Ray Wise as US President Dugan is in the lightly comic but not implausible role of portraying a personable politician clearly elected in peacetime trying to grapple with a Second Great War (perhaps I'm reading back from Twin Peaks, but is there an air of hidden desperation?). The assorted plot elements are somewhat wilder, though the destruction of Chicago by nuclear bomb is given a certain weight.

More interesting is perhaps the influence of the gameplay on tone. There's a level of pixelated detail to the cities your troops move through that implies a sufficient urban density. Being able to garrison civilian structures helps - there's an echo of Stalingrad in it all. Units frequently have secondary abilities, can gain experience over time  and benefit from close attention; especially so for the Allied faction, but not exclusively so.  When coupled with a campaign that had a number of limited-unit missions, this gives more weight to the lives of your soldiers. Campaign missions would also end with a victory screen giving your par time - the text given if you are under is rather more positive than if you are over. Compare the two texts for one mission here, another here (comparing the actual screens is difficult; apparently people don't like to show the internet that they didn't make the top of the list).

Is this all enough to make you take RA2 seriously? Probably not. Enough to invest you? I think so.

Anyway, I recently encountered and enjoyed a mercenary generator for TF2. Here's something like it for RA2. 

The Second Great War is over. You were a soldier. You aren't any more. You had a little money and a home. You haven't any more. There's rumour of a supply of gold reserves stashed in a devastated region. Perhaps you and some people with stories quite like yours could put these to better use than whatever's being done with them at the moment.

---You were a...[d8]

[1] Bog-standard infantryman (but you do bear a marked resemblance to Clint Eastwood).

[2] Rocket trooper

[3] Tank/APC driver

[4] Airship pilot or jetpack infantry

[5] Spy, saboteur or infiltrator

[6] Armoured exotic energy specialist

[7] Loyal but completely unpredictable dog

[8] Would-be psychic who deserted just before the pioneering brain surgery. You still went through all the training.

---You managed to grab a few things from the supply depot...[d10]

[1] Rapid-deploying portable foxhole

[2] Tesla gauntlet (rubber boots not included).

[3] Lots of dynamite with only the shortest of fuses.

[4] Tinnitus-inducing shoulder-mounted flak cannon

[5] Jetpack that was in the depot for vital maintenance

[6] Pyrokinetic focus module (broken targeting lobes)

[7] Plague-dart sniper rifle. Handle with care.

[8] Disguise Kit (might fool psychics, doesn't fool dogs)

[9] Briefcase of highly useful but curiously fragile tools

[10] Gun that erases people from time. You don't know how it works, how much power is left in the batteries or how you got it. But you do know that you really shouldn't have it, and everyone else knows it too.

---You also managed to obtain a set of wheels....[d8]

[1] Optical camouflage tank perpetually stuck in the form of a Scots pine. 

[2] Nippy little half-track.

[3] Teleporting supply hauler. It can instantly travel to a certain designated location within 30km, but it needs to be recharged by an industrial generator afterwards. Also really uncomfortable to drive.

[4] An airship. Full fuel tanks, full magazines, just had been fully refitted - but still very slow and very obvious. 

[5] Massive cumbersome tank with a set of propaganda speakers mounted on the rear.

[6] A big flat-bed trailer pulled by two skittering arachnoid terror drones.

[7] Six seats welded to a hovering robot tank.

[8] Truck carrying a big mobile radar jammer.

---The Gold is hidden....[d8]

[1] Somewhere at a disused military base in the Adirondacks.

[2] In the cellars of the inn of a remote Serbian mountain town.

[3] On an island in the Florida keys.

[4] At an abandoned mine in the Congo.

[5] Not far from a concealed airstrip in the southern half of Borneo.

[6] In a Mayan temple-cum-guerrilla camp in the Yucatan.

[7] At a farm in the north-east of Sichuan province.

[8] Beneath a major national monument.

---A local militia control the area with the power of.....[d8]

[1] Fleet of lightly-armed but highly mobile stealth helicopters.

[2] A pair of towers firing laser-like 'Prism' rays in a commanding location.

[3] Cloning vats. They can only make one kind of goon, but apparently that's all they need.

[4] Hacked feed to a spy satellite guaranteeing constant intel for the region.

[5] A big electromagnet that can pick up cars from twenty miles away.

[6] A self-propelled cryoshell artillery piece. 

[7] Something that looks like a UFO.

[8] Lots of mobile, customisable APCs - and a machine shop churning out spare parts.

---They are led by a warlord....[d10]

[1] A Frenchman who really likes Westerns.

[2] An incredibly handsome Russian nihilist.

[3] Captain Queeg, if Queeg had spent too long watching prism rays light up the dark.

[4] A bombastic Ruritanian cyborg who spends their free time listening to Wagner.

[5] An American journalist from the Midwest pretending to be a CIA agent. Or is it the other way round?

[6] The key member of a Yugoslav stay-behind network.

[7] Hollywood film star who had the money to get out of California at the right time, but not to get back.

[8] Korean submariner deprived of their submarine, and resentful about it.

[9] Peruvian psychic commando who had to spend three nights in No-Man's Land with a damaged interface unit experiencing hundreds of death agonies and went mad.

[10] Politician from a regional legislature who can't recall whether they were a willing collaborator, a mind-controlled puppet, a deep cover agent, was pretending to be one but not the other or just possibly was any of the above at different times - and really doesn't want anyone else to know.

Yes, it's Kelly's Heroes for RA2. Elements of Yuri's Revenge and certain RA2 mods included. The TF2 merc generator could do nicely for comrades or NPCs. 

Détruir tout: c'est une obligation.

***

By way of an ending, I will point you in the direction of S.M. Stirling's Lords of Creation series - which blend the Space Race with Edgar Rice Burroughs-style Sword and Planet fiction, so that you get American explorers dealing with the consequences of the (human, Bronze Age) Venusians getting their hands on AK-47s. The books are acceptable rather than good, but do offer a setting with a certain amount of potential. To my surprise, there's a third one on the way after seventeen years. 

*But then, I have long been of the opinion that David Lynch's Dune has the meme-making scope of the Star Wars prequels. Many do not act as if they share such a belief.

**I've seen that quote a number of times, but never where or when or to whom Cobb said it. I think the origin is in The Authorized Portfolio of Crew Insignias, by one Jeffrey Walker. 

***There is also comparison with Grenville's article on Brexotica: the dreadful rapacious amoral company is the result of the merger of Old-World hierarchy and the inscrutable Orient - against which freedom-loving American protagonists can rage. Not that (by implication) any polity in the Aliens universe comes across very well.

And yes, it seems that there was a Brexit-themed Aliens novel.

****Yes, Yuri's Revenge was rather more B-Movie. That was an expansion pack, and we may consider the base game without it.