Stealing the Sundered Lands - Introduction & Index

I want a science-fantasy, post-apocalyptic setting to fit the implied setting that comes along the Maze Rats tables. As it turns out, I've always had one in the back of my mind, but never really took the time to flesh it out. That would be Vincent Baker's The Sundered Lands

I don't care for the storygame rules, as it is, but I do want to make use of the implied setting as additional color. Plus, nobody knows or plays this anymore, so why leave it to die in the dark?

Here's all the stuff I compiled. Now, all I have to do is write an entry for every interesting bit of lore in there to make it my own, and tie it to some game-able thing. I'll probably need to draw a map too.

Also, everything is a table, because OSR. My meager additions are in italics.

D8 PLACES

1 • the Desert of Spires                   

2 • the Gray Hills                           

3 • the Jaggedlands                       

4 • the Ragged Forest

5 • the Ghost Sea

6 • the Jungle of Bones

7 • the Longmoor 

8 • the Broken Reaches

D10 ENEMIES

1 • predatory bandit-ghouls

2 • the sworn enemies of my people

3 • the murder-cult of the ungod of spiders

4 • supernatural creatures hungry for human flesh

5 • the encamped army of a king who has sworn vengeance upon me

6 • the singing hyenas of the waste

7 • warring cannibal clans

8 • followers of a grim torturer-devil

9 • monsters who dress in human skins

0 • a hunter of men, feared by many, bested by none

D20 THINGS YOU OWN

01 • wealth hidden in my clothing

02 • a long knife under my shirt

03 • the summoning-name of a ghost burned into my memory

04 • very long hair, uncut, unbound

05 • a crossing and crisscrossing of scars

06 • vast and deadly patience

07 • instincts honed by a life of violence

08 • a lead half-groat and scrip for one night’s least-grade bunk & board

09 • 4 groats in mixed coin

10 • scrip for a night’s bunk, board & bath, second-grade

11 • invitation to a certain great house for reception & dinner

12 • a tile admitting 2 to the menagerie of sins

13 • a letter of introduction

14 • scrip, fraudulently drawn, for bunk, board, bath, & upkeep

15 • new clothing, clean and fashionable

16 • new shoes, sturdy and whole

17 • a rod of stuttering light leaking green poison

18 • an old horse, loyal but tired

19 • a floating skull with a voice and mind

20 • a severed hand infected with the moonrot

D10 DANGEROUS PEOPLE

1 • Master of sword and staff.                    

2 • Wielder of ancient weapons.                 

3 • Reincarnated blood-champion.            

4 • Veteran of war, battle scarred.             

5 • Former slave and revenant.

6 • Dedicated to fallen gods.

7 • Outranger and scout.

8 • Child of blasphemy.

9 • Scholar of the six arts.

0 • Disturbing half-man poisoner. 

"A caravan on the Burnt Road. Riders on fleet horses, tireless irritable buffalo heaped with goods, silver, spices, drugs, bales and bolts of silk."

D10 DANGERS ON THE BURNT ROAD

1 • Gigantic man-eater, halfway between a turtle and a lizard

2 • Ravenous bone-birds, in flocks that obscure the sky.

3 • Serpentine coils of the great desert worms.                                                                    

4 • The band of the Rattlesnake, mercenaries with Armor, swords and spears.

5 • Fangs, gaping maw, rows of teeth. A pack of howling hyenas.

6 • Silent. A ghost-stalker, its eyes set upon your youngest.

7 • Dripping gore. The bloodied corpses of revenants, hungry for revenge.

8 • In a horde. Soldiers of the desert-king Warhol.

9 • Spikes, horns, spurs. The trappings of the outriders of House Nemeja.

0 • Exposed bone. The war-beast Aelosaurus.

D10 PROSPECTS & CIRCUMSTANCES

1 • My mother’s name accords me honor and duties here that I do not want.

2 • I have blood enemies here.

3 • I’m seeking a forbidden love, kept by a person beyond my direct challenge.

4 • I know a wealthy house I might be able to rob.

5 • I’m seeking only honest labor and wage.

6 • I’m seeking a certain master of my arts.

7 • I’m seeking for my lost blood.

8 • I’m seeking a certain place of ceremonial import.

9 • I have debts outstanding which I cannot repay.

0 • I'm seeking the man who has murdered me.

D10 QUARTERS OF THE CITY OF GULLS

1 • the Dockyards                            

2 • the Temple to No Gods             

3 • the Diggers’ Common               

4 • the Scornview                            

5 • the Stockyards                            

6 • the Market Quarter

7 • the Sovereign Course 

8 • the Outwalls

9 • Bustside

0 • the Everfall 

D6 IMPORTANT PEOPLE & PLACES

1 The House Alije

A High House in the City of Gulls. The prince Jaret Alije. His harem and eunuchs.

The captain of his guard, a fearless half-human woman called Kalo.

His acquisitions and assertions of power.

His sister, the Sororiarch Alije, whose good fate is enslaved to the fortunes of the House.

2 The Bufrolla Clan of the Gray Hills 

Cannibals, whose symbol is the walking white lizard. 

Their incarnate goddess, who demands sacrifices of fire, shame, flesh, and filth. 

Their hunting courses, set with baffles, snares, and blinds. 

The singing hounds who hunt alongside them. Their long-honed spears.

3 The Temple to No Gods

Its priestesses and priests, either devotee or penitent, in service, alike in rank and stature. 

The three visible and one concealed pillars of its study. Rella, a supplicant. 

The broken path connecting each temple to the others, no matter the earthly distance between.

4 The Charnel Halls of the dead

The necromancer Tulia Din, of unhesitating discipline. 

Her books. A living person chained in the Charnel Halls, bound for a crime, sin, or misfortune. 

A tyrant ghost, ruler of hosts of the dead, bloated with the power it has consumed. 

Its summoning-name. Its living descendants.

5 The Museum of the Upturned Past 

The scholars and students who walk among its pillars. 

The texts and diagrams of power they study, and the relics of the ancient world. 

A burglar in gray silk, unknowing. Something huge and silent. 

Words of inhuman power, enslavers of heart, thought, will.

6 The raiding-hosts of the Turtwk, with their bloody-beaked ships and warrior songs. 

Their queen Axkutke. Her seers, three boys whose antics prefigure future events. 

Their trains of battle-taken. 

Their agent, a guard of the city who has sold its security to them for promised wealth.

D12 ARMS

01 • improvised arms                                   

02 • a beam-cutter                                         

03 • a pulse lance                                               

04 • bow & arrows             
05 • a sword

06 • daggers

07 • a staff 

08 • blast armor 

09 • a long spear 

10 • chestplate & helmet 

11 • a concussive bolter 

12 • a chainsword 

D4 AMBITIONS OF A NECROMANCER

1 • to summon and enslave a powerful ghost

2 • to confront a revenant ghost and chain it in the Charnel Halls

3 • to restore one beloved to you to life

4 • to find a certain ghost and interrogate it

D10 CIRCUMSTANCES OF A GHOST'S DEATH

1 • thwarted vengeance                

2 • unfulfilled ambition                   

3 • betrayal                                        

4 • hatred                                           

5 • ceremonial sacrifice

6 • bloodthirst

7 • a death-curse 

8 • despair 

9 • sorcery

0 • duty

D6 HOW HAS THE GHOST FARED IN THE CHARNEL HALLS

1 • it has thrived, devouring many of its kind

2 • it has purified its hatred into a black and bloody will

3 • it has indulged its appetites and enacted its fears

4 • it has hunted the living, shattering mortal minds

5 • it has dallied with necromancers before this

6 • it has walked in the corner of eyes and the meekest shadows

D12 TRUE APPEARANCES OF THE GHOST

01 • hulking                                                

02 • leather-winged                                     

03 • wreathed in fire                                 

04 • bloodsoaked                

05 • venemous  

06 • howling 

07 • faceless 

08 • arachnic 

09 • unblinking 

10 • slithering 

11 • void 

12 • many-faced