Thread: Questioning chirine ba kal

Originally Posted by Hrugga

Fantastic!!! I'm impressed. You never cease to amaze...You really make me want to try my hand at some modeling or maybe just some miniature painting. Very nice. Thank you for sharing.

H:0)

Thank you! You're very welcome!

Do try! It can be a lot of fun, and can inspire your games - or, your games can inspire you to do something! It works both ways, I've found...

I'm glad you find things like this amazing, too. I like to say that I'm a throwback to an earlier time in gaming, where we didn't take ourselves (or our games) really, really seriously - as the Arneson quote goes, "We made stuff up, and we had fun!" I'm still doing that, and still having fun in the process...

Thought people might like to see this; saw Dave Wesely on Sunday, and he sold me the very first printed copy of this edition...

Originally Posted by Greentongue

Is there a problem with having the priest of an "opposing" religion officiate at a battlefield burial?

Would it have any effect on the dead or cause discontent among the living?
=

No, not really. One would prefer to have a cleric of one's own temple say a few nice words over the body, but one takes what one can get in situations like this. One usually tried to have a 'similar' cleric do the rites - a Thumis / Ksarul combination, or Vimuhla / Karakan, for example, but one is not choosy. It's always considered 'proper' to have somebody invoke the gods, and avoid being rolled into a nameless grave somewhere.

(Personal observation from my 25mm tall alter-ego: "Having rolled a lot of corpses or parts of corpses into nameless graves over the years, I have some experience with this kind of thing. Better any priest then no priest.")

Normally, the officiating cleric, on their return to civilization, visit the late lamented's family / clan and report that everything possible was done, and done in decent and proper manner. The family / clan would give the cleric their thanks, and a nice thank-you gift. The cleric would then repair to the late lamented's temple, give them pretty much the same report, and make a donation to the temple for the proper rituals to be done by the 'correct' cleric. The temple normally also thanks the cleric, and also provides them with a nice thank-you gift.

The dead are honored and sent on their way to the Isles of Teretane, and everybody is reasonably satisfied. Things have been done properly, and the temples have been respected along with the dearly departed.

Not doing all this would, as you might expect, cause problems for both the living and the dead; adventures for PCs ensue.

Does this help?

Originally Posted by Hrugga

I love the fact that "adventures ensue" almost always!!!

Uncle, I have a question concerning The Book of Ebon Bindings. Do you have any background information concerning the illustration on pg 40. Is it indeed the true form of Lord Marassu, ruler of the Fourteenth Circle(I'm sure I just answered my own question)? I find it one of the more disturbing ones...

Also, did The Professor ever talk about writing TBoEB? As far as influences or inspiration in writing it goes? Thank you.

H:0)

PS That book stands alone. I can not think of one book that I own, that I can compare it to. Scary stuff. You would have to be a madman to want to envoke most of those beings.

Well, it's why it's there; there is no problem on Tekumel that cannot be solved by hiring enough PCs to go and deal with it. The nature of the thing is to inspire adventures; it's what we do...

Lord Marassu is actually pretty tame, when you look at that art in the context of Hindu temple art. The 'demons' of Tekumel are modelled on the Rakshasa, and Phil was happy to provide Craig Smith with lots of samples from his collection of Hindu art. And yes, that is the being's true form, at least as manifested on Tekumel's plane of existence.

Phil really enjoyed doing "Ebon Bindings"; at the time, the late 1970s, grimoires and books of magic were all the rage in RPG and other circles - this was the time when Avalon Hill did their "Black Magic" (Summon demons in your living room! Fun for the whole family!) and "Witchcraft" (I liked the pop-up cardboard coven included in the box)board games. Some of the people in the original gaming group brought some of this sort of thing over to Phil's, and he snorted a lot and rolled his eyes. (This kind of thing was one of the reasons for the great Satanic Panic, by the way.)

It turned out that he had a number of the real thing in his collection of Indo-Persian manuscripts (which are now in the library of a university in Malaysia), and he - fortified by multiple cups of strong Darjeeling tea (the real stuff, imported from India) - sat down and wrote "Ebon Bindings" and did all the glyphs for the book in proper 'grimoire style'. That's why it seems to real; Phil did his research. He even did a page from the Llyani edition, to add to the fun.

Some years later, when I was working at AGI, we heard that a LDS church had burned a copy of the book as part of their anti-D&D / anti-Satanic campaign; I wrote them a nice letter, telling them about the actual literary history of the work, and they wrote me back a very nice letter apologizing for burning it - "Whoops!" they said, "Sorry about that!"

Phil laughed until he cried, when I told him about it...

And yes, you'd have to be either nuts or Eyloa...

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Well, it's why it's there; there is no problem on Tekumel that cannot be solved by hiring enough PCs to go and deal with it. The nature of the thing is to inspire adventures; it's what we do...

(snipped)

And yes, you'd have to be either nuts or Eyloa...

Uncle, I admit to liking your story about the occult. But these two passages are a nice bonus...

And I wish more Referees understood the simple concept you express in that. "Hiring adventurers, or becoming one yourself, is a way to either get ahead, or to grease the wheels of social mechanisms when they've come to a halt." Once they do, they could just look at the setting and never be in a shortage of adventures.

And now that the series of interlinked tables is done, I have to type it out.

Originally Posted by AsenRG

Uncle, I admit to liking your story about the occult. But these two passages are a nice bonus...

And I wish more Referees understood the simple concept you express in that. "Hiring adventurers, or becoming one yourself, is a way to either get ahead, or to grease the wheels of social mechanisms when they've come to a halt." Once they do, they could just look at the setting and never be in a shortage of adventures.

And now that the series of interlinked tables is done, I have to type it out.

You're welcome! The world-setting should, in my opinion, provide many and diverse reasons for having 'adventures' - we're following in the footsteps of the Grey Mouser and his tall friend, or Flash Gordon. Phil's creation does that, and we had a lot of adventures with him in exploring his world.

Looking forward to seeing it, too!

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Well, it's why it's there; there is no problem on Tekumel that cannot be solved by hiring enough PCs to go and deal with it. The nature of the thing is to inspire adventures; it's what we do...

Lord Marassu is actually pretty tame, when you look at that art in the context of Hindu temple art. The 'demons' of Tekumel are modelled on the Rakshasa, and Phil was happy to provide Craig Smith with lots of samples from his collection of Hindu art. And yes, that is the being's true form, at least as manifested on Tekumel's plane of existence.

Phil really enjoyed doing "Ebon Bindings"; at the time, the late 1970s, grimoires and books of magic were all the rage in RPG and other circles - this was the time when Avalon Hill did their "Black Magic" (Summon demons in your living room! Fun for the whole family!) and "Witchcraft" (I liked the pop-up cardboard coven included in the box)board games. Some of the people in the original gaming group brought some of this sort of thing over to Phil's, and he snorted a lot and rolled his eyes. (This kind of thing was one of the reasons for the great Satanic Panic, by the way.)

It turned out that he had a number of the real thing in his collection of Indo-Persian manuscripts (which are now in the library of a university in Malaysia), and he - fortified by multiple cups of strong Darjeeling tea (the real stuff, imported from India) - sat down and wrote "Ebon Bindings" and did all the glyphs for the book in proper 'grimoire style'. That's why it seems to real; Phil did his research. He even did a page from the Llyani edition, to add to the fun.

Some years later, when I was working at AGI, we heard that a LDS church had burned a copy of the book as part of their anti-D&D / anti-Satanic campaign; I wrote them a nice letter, telling them about the actual literary history of the work, and they wrote me back a very nice letter apologizing for burning it - "Whoops!" they said, "Sorry about that!"

Phil laughed until he cried, when I told him about it...

And yes, you'd have to be either nuts or Eyloa...

Thank you. These stories never cease to amaze me. I have never seen "Black Magic" or "Witchcraft", but I have a feeling they are not as indepth as TBoEB. It really has so much in there(even about my namesake). I really loved reading about those arrogant wizards sealing their doom by envoking those beings. Even with all the precautions taken, "Adventures Ensue"...!!! Fantastic stuff.

H:0)