Table of Contents
The Troll's Companion is now available at lulu.com! This includes a plethora of new material, as well as online favorites like the Iron Tower and Bestiary.
I am now posting my blogs here for angelfire as well:
Tori Bergquist's Angelfire Blogspot
Check out my MySpace Blog for reviews, commentary, and general noise at: Tori Bergquist's Blog and Myspace page
Some NPC encounters using the new 4th edition rules
Molorn, a key NPC and possible foe for the new 4E game
Check out the newly scanned maps of Lingusia!
The City of Octzel Campaign Setting - UPDATED 7/11/08 to include new formatting, layout, and some editing; uses 4E compatible terminology, too!
The Official Compiled Character Tables: Every chart and form you'll need for your AD&D or OSRIC games!
The Keepers of Lingusia Campaign Setting
Welcome to the Multicosm! This site is dedicated to archiving all of my endeavours in writing for my various preferred role playing games, especially the D20 System for Dungeons & Dragons, the Tri-Stat DX system, GURPS, and the venerable Tunnels & Trolls. Much of the material in the Multicosm is geared towards mytho-historical campaigning, and the premiere campaign is the Ancient Realms of the Roman Republic. This site is updated about as often as NASA lands a successful Martial Lander. Enjoy!
Update 05/14/08 Part 2: I noticed while adding the scanned maps that my City of Octzel write-up (which has been around in various forms for ages) was not posted, so I went ahead and corrected that as well as putting up the two parts to the City Map of Octzel. The setting is written generically; characters are given classes and levels, but stats are up to the GM, so you should be able to use it with your favorite flavor of role playing game easily! This is, of course, a major city of the Middle Kingdoms in Lingusia, and I used it as the center of many, many campaigns, especially in the mid nineties. Still, I think it could easily be ported to any other suitably adventurous sword & sorcery setting if you like for your own adventures.
Update 05/14/08: Well, I at long last have the ability to scan stuff, so I will be putting all of my Lingusia maps up for viewing (so those of you who have been waiting for eons for these maps can now release your breath.) A quick note: I haven't gotten too much farther on any Runquest edition of Lingusia (although the Chirak campaign for Runequest is basically complete) but with 4th edition D&D looming around the corner, I plan to put up a 4E-ready edition for download just as soon as I've got my hands on the new books. After all the previews and demo releases (and leaks) I am pretty confident that 4E D&D is going to be a lot of fun. Okay, that's it for now, keep checking back for more maps; if I get all of them up, there will be about 40-60 PDF map files available by the end of all this!
Update 04/24/08: Just a quick update at the moment (lots of behind the scenes writing going on, but nothing new to speak of yet.) I was mulling over running a campaign using Ex Machina (been getting back in the the cyberpunk mood lately) when I realized that the Tri-Stat DX PDF, the free one that Guardians of Order distributed back when they were still in business, was getting a bit hard to find, so I have posted a download of the Tri-Stat DX System to insure it never goes away. Tri-Stat DX is a tough system to beat; it stands out as my favorite multi-genre system, and I hope the mechanics transcend the company and its originators.
Update 03/26/08: Wow, two updates in one year! I was recently contacted by Andreas Davour about The Bullow Lands solitaire still being broken...I thought I'd fixed it, apparently not! Argh...anyway, it was published in revised form not long ago by Outlaw Press, so I had a fixed and completed copy lying around which is now available for download in the index above.
On a quick side note, I have a pretty much complete manuscript for my Realms of Chirak campaign setting, compatible with the Runequest SRD. I have also spoken with the guys at Chaosium about a BRP-compatible edition, and that seems do-able. I suppose all we need now is for BRP to get an official release. In any case, Realms of Chirak's Runequest edition is under playtest and will likely see print at Lulu before the year is out; I am currently also shopping for artwork, so if any of you have suggestions they are most welcome.
On the Tunnels & Trolls Convention this August 1st-3rd (see more over at Flyingbuffalo.com) I will be running two T&T modules and an MSPE module; I got the ay-okay from Rick Loomis. I also talked to Rick about publishing new T&T content with approval, and he said that would be workable, too, so I might very well attempt to release some new T&T stuff through POD via Lulu as well, soon. Anyone interested in a new Keepers of Lingusia written for T&T?
Oh, and I took a momen to update my links and top ten list at the bottom of the web page for those who are keeping track...they were both loooong overdue.
Update 01/31/08: Jeez has it really been a year since my last update? Ai-yi-yi! Anyway, I've been semi active in blogging, getting more so as time rolls by at my myspace page (link above). I'm going to cross-post some of those blogs here, as well, to see if there's any interest via the angelfire blog. Personally, I much prefer the myspace interface, but have had a hard time figuring out how to search blogs over there casually; there doesn't appear to be a browser option that's very efficient; you either stumble across a blog or you know the person in your "friends" network; kind of irritating. But it's still infinitely more user-friendly than the angelfire blog tool.
So anyway, life for 2007 was good. My current gaming projects hav been light, but I have been dilligently working behind the scenes to finally do a version of Keepers of Lingusia for Runequest, as I promised, and I am about half way there. I am also developing my previously unpublished Realms of Chirak campaign setting as a Runequest-OGL product that will eventually see print on lulu.com. This is a particularly special project for me, as it is oneof my finest developments, and Chirak originally saw life in Runequest 3rd edition, anyway, so it's basically coming back home to roost.
These days, I've pretty much given up on the D20/3.5 movement, and eagerly look forward to seeing what 4th edition looks like, but the truth of the matter is, I think age has made me rather soft when it comes to gaming. The level of complexity to be found in, say, Runequest and Basic Role Playing (of which I have one of the coveted advance readers proofs, yay!) is about all I can handle. When I want some good old fashion D&D-style gaming, I rely on my bi-weekly AD&D 1/2E group, even though I've never quite reconciled my distaste for the vagaries of the system with my constant use of it over the years. In truth, Castles & Crusades remains my personal favorite for classic D&D gaming, and 4E will have to be pretty snazzy (and easy to apply and use) to usurp C&C from its roost. I've never been a wargamer, and RPGs like D20, which move so concretely in to the ream of miniatures wargaming, simply do not jive well with my personal tastes.
Long story short, I plan to put more content up here soon for use with C&C, BRP, and Runequest. I've got some new scenarios in the works, and all I really need right now is an effective (and easy) way to build or scan large maps in to files that I can include, so I can, among other things, finally get the Keepers of Lingusia maps up....it would be nice if people could finally see the geography of that world, I imagine! Any suggestions on appropriate utilities for such a venture are welcome; I've found a few cheap (read: free) mapmaking utlities, but they are awfully time-consuming. I'd rather just find a way to scan my home-made maps in, although my scanner is way to small for the job.
A bit of exciting news: I got an invitation from Rick Loomis of Flying Buffalo to attend the first annual Tunnels & Trolls convention in Phoenix, AZ from August 1st to 3rd as a guest. So I will be there (with Jody) as will may other T&Ters. One great thing about Tunnels & Trolls is that game has an amazing lifespan! I really loved Ken St. Andre's 7th edition rules that Fiery Dragon produced, and am hopeful that they will release the 7th edition rules someday in a format closer to the 5/5.5 edition ruleset from Flying Buffalo. Likewise, James Shipman of Outlaw Press has been knocking out an amazing number of T&T sourcebooks, including some revisions of my very, very old T&T stuff (The solo Abderan's Folly was revised and republished about a year ago with an awesome cover, for instance). T&T has always been a game which lived through its fans, and it's nice to see that the fans are strong. T&T always has and always will be on my short list of "games I will play at the drop of a hat," should the opportunity arise. Especially 7E, which is just perfect, in my opinion.
Okay, that's all to report for now. More later!
Update 12/04/2006: A brief update to let you all know I am alive and well, still living the roller-coaster of life in New Mexico. I have several more updates for the site in the works, so more will appear soon! Most notable is my new fascination for Mongoose Publishing's take on Runequest. Back in the day, the first game system to really catch my attention and drag it away from AD&D was the 2nd edition of Runequest (along with T&T, of course). I ran some fun campaigns in RQ2 which were inspired by the Glorantha seting, but nestled in the corner of Lingusia called Avilin (see the Gazetteer for more on that). Later, I ran a lengthy RQ3 campaign in college but my group was all ga ga over AD&D 2nd edition and we converted to that after the RQ3 campaign ended, but it was a hell of a lot of fun. In 1992 or so, I ran more RQ3 and indeed the first campaign ever for my Realms of Chirak campaign (not on site yet, but eventually), and the groundwork for that new, spiffy universe of post-armaggeddon "all the gods are dead" fantasy began.
Now comes the present day, and Mongoose has managed to revamp and resurrect Runequest big time, with a much wider focus on other campaign worlds than Glorantha (although their Glorantha 2nd Age treatment is gorgeous, I have to say). For myself, I've spent a long time mulling over the D20 system, and have grown increasingly discontent with both it and it's offspring (not you C&C, I could never be mad at you!). As such, I have decided to really narrow my focus for the next year or more of gaming to pretty much my fave three: Runequest, GURPS, and the ubiquitous Call of Cthulhu. At the very least it will save my pocketbook a bit discomfort by not buying all the D20/D&D books out there(not too much though....Mongoose has an aggressive publishing schedule for RQ). As a result, I want to narro my writing focus as well, and for gaming that means staying focus with these systems (and some C&C thrown in for good measure....did I mention I have a retro group going locally that plays 1st edition? I will convert them to C&C eventually, heh heh!)
Enough of my ramblings....I will have a KOL adaptation for MRQ up soon, and will likely try to even OGL it so it's fully compliant with publishing issues, too. Indeed, I am tempted to make it available over at lulu.com as a POD product for anyone interested, if I can get some decent art and maps up, as well. We'll see.
Alright, hope you've all had a fine year. More to come...!
Update 5/22/2006: I must be on a roll. You can now get a Castles & Crusades edition of Gazetteer Keepers of Lingusia here. I have included some house rules for C&C I use in the back of the pdf, but you can also get the house rules all by themselves here.
Update 5/21/2006: Okay, I've finally done it: the first installment of the Keepers of Lingusia Campaign Book can be found here. I have partially complete versions of KOL for GURPS, T&T and D20 (of which this one is for D20), and am working on HARP and C&C editions. I will most definitely post C&C and T&T editions of KOL as soon as they are ready! I am also trying to scan in maps, since a campaign setting for gaming is essentially useless without some maps.
I'd also like to start a separate page to talk Conan. Specifically, I was thinking of more material adapted to the Conan rpg from various pastiche novels (the original Howard tales have been so well-covered already by other sites and official material) as well as discussion and reviews on such books, as I notice that Howard/Conan fans seem to be very verbose on the web and I have a few opinions, too....plus, I have been galvanized by some of the fascinating forum discussions on my books (Tales of the Black Kingdoms and Messantia) over at the Mongoose Publishing forums. One fellow even wrote some awesome fan-fic about the campaign his brother ran using Tales of the Black Kingdoms which was a hoot to read; I am going to see if I can get permission to post it over here, too.
Update part 2: 9.25.05: Today I have included a scenario I ran a few years ago, featuring magic and mystery in the age of Charlemagne. Featuring Tunnels & Trolls 7th edition rules, maps and pregenerated characters, The Iron Tower gives you everything you need to start a game of the new T&T! Also, I added a section for The World of Isomular a setting that completely utilizes the Expanded Psionics Handbook.
The big gaming excitement for me lately has been (well, besides World of Warcraft; say hi to Kalitherios on Cenarius server) the return of old-school gaming. By this I mean games which harken back to the good old days....you know, when I was young and still full of life. Most exciting of these new games is the 7th edition release of the Tunnels & Trolls rules by Fiery Dragon. I have posted a Bestiary of Lingusia, monsters which come from my home campaign, written for use with the new 7th edition rules (yes, the fat rulebook with Ken's work inside, not that other thing in the box). The plan is to do more such fun like that, including solitaire updates and more Keepers of Lingusia goodness.
The second exciting event? Castles & Crusades, another fine retro-system which manages to capture all the stuff I loved about old classic D&D without all the aggravation (well, maybe a smidgeon of it). Truth be told, I think I've grown tired of the ponderously large library of D20 material out there, and I am really enjoying this trend towards good, simple fun. Savage Worlds is another similar system I have gotten in to this year for similar reasons.
That all said, I really have to suggest you go check out Eternal Rome, one of the Mythic Vistas setting books just released from Green Ronin. A fabulous treatment of the Roman Empire in a D20 game setting, best job I've seen yet, even better than their other works (Skull & Bones and The Trojan War). If you've enjoyed my stuff on Rome in this site, you definitely will want this book.
I am also starting a GURPS 4th Edition Archive, for material I do relating to GURPS 4th edition, a fine advancement of my favorite generic universal role playing system, if I do say. The archive shall include some NPCs from a recent Weird Horror campaign I ran over the last year or so.
Well, that's it for the moment. Hopefully I will be more consistent in my efforts to update this site. Till next time, ciao!
Anyway, I have had some fun gaming this last year, and had a chance to write two products for the Conan RPG with Mongoose Publishing, both about to come out anytime now. Look for my work in books 2 and 3 of the Messantia Adventures boxed set, and the complete text of Tales of the Black Kingdom. Check out the web link at the bottom of the page, the cover art is great, and I've got to say, I'm very happy with the Conan RPG these days.
I still have many projects in the woodwork. Hopefully soon I shall have some full-fledged PDFs to release. I shall (as ever) try to update this site in a timely manner.....!
Update 2.22.04: I had some inspiring thoughts about gaming in a fantasy-historical Roman Underworld Campaign after I began reading the innovative Ghostwalk campaign setting. The idea of a physical location for the afterlife, a portal in a city (Rome), spirits that exist and can interact with the living from this region, and deities of the underworld which are connected to or vie for this portal (Ceres, Orcus, Dis Pater, Mania, etc.) are actually a compelling idea that borrows a lot in its principles from the Roman myths of the afterlife.
I stumbled across an interesting site, which is a handy Atlas of the Ancient Roman World. Very useful for gaming during the period!
Joy of joys, the Cthulhu: Dark Ages roleplaying game is now out. It's self-contained, fully compatible with CoC 5.6, and has a very informative and inspiring take on the mythos during the period from about 950 to 1050 A.D. As I was reading it, it was clearly an inspirational work of the classic Cthulhu tales (some of which have been set around this period) and some of the more conventional medieval mystery novels on the market; C:DA would be a fine system for managing a Cthulhoid take on Umberto Eco's unique medieval mystery, The Name of the Rose.
Update 2.20.04: It's been a month; no easy release from the drudgery of day to day work, alas. I have been working extensively on some D20 system projects which I would like to try releasing in a pdf format for purchase; will have to see if that comes to fruition.
Update 1.06.04:After an enormously long absence (about a year), I have once again found a quiet spot to mess around with this great little plot of land in Angel Fire territory. I've got some revisions and updates to include here, as well as a bit of reformatting: time to resume my lessons in using HTML!
The Keepers of Lingusia is now available for download or in soft cover format at lulu.com!
The Map of Northern Octzel City's Northern Stretch
The Map of Octzel City's Southern Stretch
The Bullow Lands corrected solitaire for T&T is now here!
The Ancient Realms Campaign: Hidden Magic and Mystery Cults in the Roman Republic during the rise of the Triumvirate
An adventure scenario: The Iron Tower For Tunnels & Trolls 7th edition
The Ad Astra Savage Worlds Edition in which the Ad Astra sci-fi setting gets savaged!
A Tunnels & Trolls 7th Edition Bestiary featuring monsters of Lingusia
The GURPS 4th Edition Archive featuring some useful Horror NPCs
Isomular: The Whispering Kingdoms is being retooled in to a True20 setting. I think I'll try to make this one fully licensed, too. True20's powers system works really, really well for the Planetary Romance style of Isomular.
The D20 Resource Archive
NEW: Ad Astra A hard-Sci Fi space opera for Tri-Stat DX
The Tunnels & Trolls Archive
The World of Aichwod, a D20 Campaign World
NEW: Lords of Chaco D20 A first draft of the Mythic Southwest setting for the D20 system
The Caves of Chaos a Classic D20 romp through dungeon halls dark and dreary!
Tris-Stat DX can be found for free download at rpgnow.com (Thanks for the tip!) so I have no need to keep one hosted here.
Update 5/21/2006 part 2: And now you can get the second part, the Gazetteer of Lingusia as well!
Update 5/20/2006: Well, after another prolonged absense I return....! I have a conversion of the Lingusian Bestiary to Castles & Crusades. I was working on doing the Bestiary for D20 stats, and grew increasingly irritated at what a pain it is to work out monstrous stat blocks for the system when I gave up and decided to go with the alarmingly simple, easier Castles & Crusades setup. In fact, I am very tempted to convert my entire Lingusia campaign setting over to C&C and post it here....maybe I shall! C&C is certainly more in keeping with the theme of that campaign, which was born out of a mix of basic, 1st and 2nd edition AD&D along with a heavy influence of T&T and Runequest (oh and 1st edition GURPS, too)....so one would argue that Lingusia was very much an "old school" campaign setting. I think I shall, in fact, post some files on the page for those who are interested in seeing the current updates on Lingusia, both for old players from prior campaigns and fans of the original Keepers of Lingusia supplement I released for T&T back in 1988 or therabouts. Anyway, you can find the new Lingusian Bestiary for Castles & Crusades here.
Update 9.25.05: Sticking to my twice-annual updates, I have finally been inspired to return and do some work here. For those interested, I have moved from Seattle, Washington to the dry deserts of Albuquerque, New Mexico. The plan right now is to return to school at the University of New Mexico, here's hoping I pull it off!
Update 4.11.05: Well, as usual I manage to go a year and some before bothering to note that I am still alive on my site. I have been very busy this last year, with a job in the declining newspaper industry (Seattle Times) that at last culminated in a lay-off. I was not going to be affected (seniority, union spot and all that) but volunteered for the lay-off due to a lucrative buy-out package and general sense of dissatisfaction with poor management and suspect policies. My opinion was that, unfortunately, the company was facing a serious and possibly inevitable downward spiral, and it made sense to get out while it might still yield a profit.
Best news of this month is that the Conan RPG from Mongoose Publishing has been released, and it is a fine adaptation, I must say. Kudos to the authors for their effort and research. Even at the $50 price tag, it's worth a look. For those of you whodidn't know, I'm an old R.E. Howard fan, and have a very large collection of the many different print editions of his work over the decades past. I also collect all Conan related novels and miscellany as time and money permits. No, I am not one of those guys who bids $600+ on ebay for rare early hard covers of Howard's works, but yes, I do have most of the soft cover print editions, including some of his westerns and boxing tales.
On another note, I have been experimenting with Arcana Unearthed, the alternative Player's Handbook for D20, and have found Monte Cook's latest effort to be a great non-traditional fantasy resource, with a lot of interesting and innovative ideas. My local group has been gracious enough to try it out, and we've got a campaign going.
Meanwhile, my other group is looking for some change, and after hitting a pause on a good Dark Future horror campaign set in a universe with one part "Firefly" and one part "Aliens," I am thinking of heading back to my Ancient Realms of the Roman Republic campaign, so stay tuned, I may start generating new material for it. We'll see....
Anyway, have a fine time on the internet, people. Hopefully more soon!
--Tori Bergquist
New material now includes: Ad Astra, my high-concept SF setting has been updated with new material and revised for use with Tri-Stat DX. Lords of Chaco has been added, a first draft of a work in progress on gaming in the mythic southwest of pre-columbian America. Finally, I've added a fun bit: The Caves of Chaos for D20; everyone has one, a dungeon that stands as the first, greatest, and most deadly product of the GM's imagination from yesteryear. I took my first great dungeon creation and revamped it for D20.
Coming Soon: Hell if I know! No promises, just hopes: I am still working on the Lords of Chaco setting using D20 rules to create a mytho-historical land set in the precolumbian American Southwest. I have included a first draft of what I have so far (mostly rules) in the content links.
Top Ten Reasons to Carry a Camcorder Everywhere:
When you're ready to continue your tour of the Worlds of Cyberspace, I suggest:
The Web Page of Ken St. Andre, creator of Tunnels & Trolls!
Rpg.net, the definitive place to go for the discerning Intarweb Gamer
Outlaw Press, the official producer of new T&T Books and Solos!
Ogre Cave, an infrequent but informative news site for gaming
FRPGames, a great online store. Very reliable, always up to date!
Lost Civilizations Uncovered, a great page on debunking ufology and other modern pseudsciences
Tori bergquist's Myspace page and blog spot
The Phillip Jose Farmer fan site. Best author ever. Close enough, anyway.
Mongoose Publishing, the makers of the Conan RPG
Acts of Gord. I'll never own a retail shop, I swear!
Go here for an Index of online works including E.R. Burroughs and H.G. Wells!
Excellent author index and book site
Slashdot, my preferred Nerd News Source