Treasure and Mesopotamia

"Currency evolved from two basic innovations: the use of counters to assure that shipments arrived with the same goods that were shipped, and later with the use of silver ingots to represent stored value in the form of grain. Both of these developments had occurred by 2000 BC. Originally money was a form of receipting grain stored in temple granaries in Sumer in ancient Mesopotamia, then Ancient Egypt."

  - Wikipedia, currency.

"In the earlier second millennium there are references to kaspum kankum "sealed bags of silver." Sealed silver is also noted in texts of the late third millennium and the Old Assyrian documents from Cappadocia mention silver "marked" (uddu) with its weight (CAD s.v. idu 4.a). Copper might be packed into purses called (c)hurshianu (CAD s.v.; Dercksen). "

  - ANCIENT ECONOMIES I, Morris Silver

"The ancient economy was mainly based on subsistence farming. The Shekel referred to an ancient unit of weight and currency. The first usage of the term came from Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC. and referred to a specific mass of barley which related other values in a metric such as silver, bronze, copper etc. A barley/shekel was originally both a unit of currency and a unit of weight... just as the British Pound was originally a unit denominating a one pound mass of silver."

  - Wikipedia, Economy - Ancient Times

My research into Sumerian history and Mesopotamia for the Tombs of Hulkursag has taken me into some really cool mental exercises. Part of the module will be to introduce my take on an alternative history of Mesopotamia, where the Gods really do walk the Earth. (This, by the way, has made me very aware that I don't have a single source book on Deities - no OD&D or AD&D books). Reading up on the culture and viewpoints makes me realize how cultural D&D really is. I know this is no surprise to the smarter of my readers, but it's the difference of "hearing" it and really seeing it.

One such area is the concept of treasure. We, as players, are used to gold pieces, gems, scrolls and things that "feel" right - we're not that far removed from reality in how we view wealth and things of value. Taking a step back into history means that we're winding back the clock and our conceptions on how wealth was collected and distributed. The above quotes really point that out - coin currency wasn't widely used until maybe late in the Mesopotamian era, more likely in the early Greek era. Trade was based on barter and a rough conceptualization of the value of commodities against each other. Silver was the standard and it's use wasn't a "coin" but a weight equivalent. This means that our intrepid band of adventurers exploring the Lands between the Rivers aren't going to be finding chests of gold.

Wealth was also expressed in jewelry and adornments, as well as possessions. Mesopotamian tombs (what few have been found) are not filled with coins, but with rings, necklaces, crowns and headdresses and items of value like musical instruments, oxen carts and even slaves. Now everyone seems to love finding lots of gems and jewels, but what is the very first thing the vast majority of the adventurers do? They go find a fence in town and get gold coins. That's not going to happen in Mesopotamia.

This brings me to a design issue - how far to do I "break" the conventional wisdom of D&D? When players sit down for D&D, there are expectations based on previous play and based on what we perceive D&D to be. Presenting a module and setting that breaks those expectations too much makes it possible that people are going to get frustrated and give up. Do players really want to buy equipment based on trading 5 shekels of grain that they have to store and carry somewhere? I doubt it. I know I wouldn't want to do that - and that's a metric I usually use on my first decisions about a game - would I like it?

I think I may change the terms, but leave the basics the same - gold is now "silver (ingots/shekels)" (same diff), silver becomes "copper" - there is no equivalent to copper pieces in my game. Players won't find mounds and mounds of gold, but if I cast it right, the difference is more in the names, not the feel.

Treasure is going to be more about finding the jewelry and gems and things that can be traded. I'll give equivalent values (in silver) but players won't be able to fence the 3 rings and 2 copper helmets into coins - so they'd better find a secure place to hold their stashes.

Another interesting point is that metal is rare - so much so that finding a metal weapon is equivalent to finding a +1 to +3 weapon.

Does breaking the convention too far limit what you can do, especially in terms of the "rewards"? I think we're all used to strange settings and even limits on classes and races, but the treasure and methods of economy in D&D? I'm not so sure.

What do you think?

(Picture from studio22k.com)

OD&D Solo game w/wife - The Parade

It has been a month since I last sat down at the table with @theprincesswife for Swords & Wizardry/OD&D play. She's just been feeling so worn out, she hasn't felt like playing. I was really surprised when Saturday night she asked if we could play. Could we? I think I had the dice, minis and campaign binder out in record time.

When we last played, a bit of player/DM miscommunication led Aeli and her band of henchmen and hirelings to the Tower of Zenopus rather than the Minotaur Mage's tower. She had been sent there to look into the issue of possible bandits in the tower, who'd been plauging Westport for weeks. She took her first steps back into her old stomping ground and ... [insert record needle scratch noise here] ... except we had to pause for a moment where her almost 8 month old map confused her and I had to tell her what she was seeing versus what she'd put down on paper.

Right, so we got that all set and she marches up a familiar hallway to find doors that are spiked shut. After a rather noisy series of attempts at yanking them open (and requisite wandering monster rolls), she came face to face with an unexpected sight... bandits AND goblins with a green fist on their tunics! (Note to my AD&D campaign players - yes, I reuse ideas. This is one of my favorite metal songs!)

A bit of nasty negotiation happened and resulted in Aeli slamming the door shut on the group and hightailing it out of the dungeon. She didn't like the odds of almost 2 to 1 and decided to go get reinforcements. A quick trip to the Keep and discussion with the Captain of the Guard ("You *are* the Champion of Westport, right?") and a very annoyed Aeli had 2 militia men and one 1st level fighter.

Back to the dungeon and the band of bandits and goblins sprung an ambush with a volley of arrows down a corridor as soon as the our party of adventurers entered. A chase through the Tower and several rooms found one goblin dead and another cowering, begging for mercy.

DM Note - this is one of the areas where I have a bit of a mental block - adjudicating running battles. My MO up till now has been if movement rates are equal, if the ones doing the chasing get initiative, they can perform a "charge" attack. Otherwise, if the pursued win initiative, I feel they'd somehow kept out of range for an attack. If there's a difference in favor of the pursuers, they can chase and end it with a charge attack. If it's in favor of the pursued, well... keep running, boys! It's probably not the cleanest ruling, but it works.

So Aeli and company tie up the goblin and start to drag him out of the dungeon. He starts raising a ruckus, so one of the hireling whacks him in the mouth! Aeli was in no mood. They drag him out into the sunlight, at which point No-took starts screaming in pain. They cover him with a sack and drag him through the city.

So here's an armed party, dragging a moaning, crying goblin tied up through a bustling seaport. So what does my wife do? "What tavern is nearest? I'm thirsty!" Probably one of the nastiest, lowdown places in Westport, but at the sight of almost 10 well-armed warriors (and one mage - my NPC Tironell - who at this point was getting a neck-ache shaking his head in disbelief...) the whole bar cleared out. Aeli had her drink, they proceeded to the Keep at which point the game ended. Next game, she'll get the results of the interrogation.

Sometimes you just have to let your players really do crazy stuff - I was rolling the entire time Aeli/@theprincesswife were parading the captured goblin through town. Not too subtle, my wife's character... it's great!

I'm really hoping we can keep doing these 1 to 2 hour sessions - she was cheered up after it was over.

Mesopotamian Tombs

When I was designing the Tombs of Hultep-Khoa back in March, I stumbled onto this fascinating atlas of the Valley of the Kings tombs at Thebes, Egypt. I still love going to that site.

You'll then understand the pleasure I had in finding an interactive map of the Royal Tombs of Ur at the British Museum's website. It's fascinating that this is a complex, very similar to VotK. I won't have to change much on my maps, then. :)

However, the Tombs just became enclosed in a ziggurat.


(Photographs Copyright by Lasse Jensen, all rights reserved.)

The fate of the Tombs of Hultep Khoa

So... I pitched my module idea to a publisher who liked the concept of the tomb and a 4 level dungeon already finished, but wanted it non-Egyptian and wanted to stick to their trade dress. The concept I pitched for how to present this module is very different. This publisher was really cool and I totally appreciated his comments. I think, though, I want to test my idea badly enough that I'm going to take LotFP's route and self publish. I don't know how this will go, but we'll see.

One change, though, is that this is going to change from an Egyptian themed adventure to a Sumerian/Bronze Age themed adventure and it will start including some aspects of an alternative Bronze Age that literary influences will play a part of. My first objective is to do a bit of reading on Sumerian history to get a bit more into that mindset - that may also mean a trip to the Oriental Museum in Chicago - one of my most favorite destinations.

So the dungeon's name has changed - it is now the Tomb of Hul-Kur-a-sag.

This will be my Next Big Project once I get my head back together from the scare of my wife's illness. You're probably going to see a lot more stuff being written about that age period as I do my research.

Speaking of my wife, she's doing as well as can be. We know that the issue is not life-threatening cancer, so the huge sucking black hole in my soul has gone away - which was one of the reasons my head was not into gaming. We still have to go to specialists to find out what *is* wrong, but we're going thru that. She's still not at work, and we're dealing with the loss of income the best we can.

Which brings me to a possible change to this blog. You see, my whole concept for this blog, aside from sharing my love of playing solo S&W/OD&D w/my wife and my OSRIC/AD&D campaign, was to share free stuff in the love of the game. But... I'm thinking of hanging a donation button on it, given the change in my finances. I have really mixed feelings about that. One, the generosity of friends can never be underestimated -- but I was brought up with some strict sensibilities towards money and propriety and that factors into how I feel about the donate button. I don't begrudge anyone else doing it, but I'm still wrestling with it myself. Not that I expect to get rich, but the fact that I am reaching a hand out to my virtual friends and readers ... it's not pride, it's that is the exchange of what I do here really fair to ask for money? I know, shut the *bleep* up, Chgowiz, and suck it up...

I am so going to get eaten alive tomorrow by the OSR-cognoscenti at the TARGA conference call.

The Siege Perilous - Ultima RPG - playtest release

"Siege Perilous" is an RPG based on the Ultima Age of Darkness CRPG games - #1 through #3. It is developed from an adaptation of the Swords & Wizardry White Box (1st printing) and uses several other sources - Skathros's S&W Companion Rules, a magic system developed by Arminath, the Minimal Space Combat system by Timoth Swenson and a lot of glue, rewriting, adaptation and content by myself. This game uses names, monsters, spells, settings and features from all 3 of the games.

Siege Perilous - Rulebook (link updated 4/1/25 - not an April Fool's joke!)
Siege Perilous - Game Referee's Guide (link updated 4/1/25 - not an April Fool's joke!)
Siege Perilous - Hawkwind's Gazeteer: Perinia (ver: 9/2/09 - no more than outline at this point)

It's not a faithful representation of the "canon" timeline - I had to make a hybrid game that a Game Referee could use to represent any point in time with the established Ultima universe. It's also adaptable enough that a Game Referee can make their own Ultima. Future settings information is going to assume the state of Sosaria in Ultima 1, based on my campaign world.

The rules themselves that I've been hacking over the months are "finished" in that they can be playtested. The chargen, task resolution, combat, magic, naval combat and space travel/combat is complete. The list of monsters and treasure is complete.

Left to be done:
- Fill in magic item (potions, items, spells) creation rules (Rules)
- Fill in Ultima setting overview information (Game Master Guide)
- Finish first setting mini-book (Peninsula of Perinia)

Before we go much further, let me please say two things:

First, these rules and settings use content from the first three Ultima CRPG games: Ultima I – The First Age of Darkness, Ultima II – Revenge of the Enchantress and Ultima III – Exodus. These three games were released from 1980 through 1983 and formed the basis for the wildly popular Ultima CRPG series and the Ultima On-line MMORPG.

Any content stemming from the Ultima games is used without permission and all copyrights, registered trademarks and licenses for the Ultima CRPGs are property of Electronic Arts and Origin Systems. I am doing this interpretation as a fan derivative work, under what I believe is Fair Use. I hold no license to any content save the adaptations to the rules/content that is of my own creation. The sole purpose of this work is to add to the pleasure and experience of the Ultima world and to bring new fans to enjoy the fantastic story and setting that was created almost 30 years ago.

That also means that technically, I'm in violation of the Swords & Wizardry White Box OGL license and terms, but I've also spoken with Matt Finch who basically said "I'm not going to sue you."

So if you go and use these rules, understand this is a homebrew system that I'm sharing with other Ultima fans. If you try and make some cash on this deal, I'm not responsible for the lawyers that might come your way.

The second thing I want to say is that being this is a homebrew system, it's liable to be tinkered with, changed, and even rewritten wholesale. I will try and announce when I've made changes, but the version you download/print is liable to be different from something that is in the future. That also means that if you discover a problem, bug, errata or major issue, I'm more likely to change it on the fly if it fits with my Ultima campaign.

So having said all that, please enjoy!