The Cherry Pit and the Bargain

Bad Books for Bad People, Episode 84: The Cherry Pit and The Bargain

It’s time for Jack and Kate to explore their vintage paperback piles and trade tales from the yellowed pages of the past. Jack wades through the sweltering psychosexual Southern Gothickry of Donald Harington’s 1965 sex comedy (?) The Cherry Pit while Kate learns what happens when Hitler faces off with Dracula in Jon Ruddy’s 1990 shock-horror masterpiece (?) The Bargain.

Will we encounter the worst Van Helsings of all time? Why don’t the cool madams in exploitation novels get their own books? What are “big dinners” and how often will “big dinners” be referenced? All these questions and more will be explored in this episode of Bad Books for Bad People.

Veil

The time has come to turn our eyes to the lawless sanctum of outlaws and heretics in Krevborna: the ruined and ruinous city of Veil! 

It took me a long time to figure out what Veil was really all about. It wasn't until I stumbled on the idea of a city given over to gang warfare coupled with Silent Hill aesthetic notes that things really got cooking for this area of the setting.

Veil

A Fallen City of the Downtrodden and Outcast

Once regarded as one of the jewels of Krevborna, Veil was originally a Vlaak city renowned for its beauty. Today, Veil is a shadow of its former self. Generations ago, the thriving city of Veil was put to the torch by the Church of Holy Blood’s Inquisition to flush out the blasphemous blood cult that had overrun it. It now consists of hastily repaired houses, looted ruins, and ramshackle shelters made from scavenged materials. The stout walls that protected the city in ages past are broken and in dire need of repair.

Greatly diminished from its golden age as a metropolis, Veil is haunted by the ever-present reek of smoke, soot, and ember, as the fire that razed it still burns in the tunnels beneath its streets due to the strength of a desperate man’s dying curse. Noxious fumes leak from cracks in the ground, and cold fogs obscure the city's ruined wards.

Veil is currently a haven for outlaws, heretics, and those who do not want to be found by the world at large. In Veil, the strong dominate the weak. It is expected that those with power will abuse it and that those without must suffer under oppression.

Hallmarks

The following elements and aesthetic notes define Veil:

    • Veil was once a grand Vlaak city, but it has since fallen into ruinous decay.

    • Veil is a vile den of crime and heresy; many of its residents are apostates and outlaws hiding from justice.

    • The city is dominated by criminal gangs who wage war against one another for territory and ill-gotten wealth.

    • A mercenary general has recently taken up residence in a former barracks; she is raising an army for an unknown purpose.

    • A strange, opium-like drug known as midnight bell is peddled in Veil; using the intoxicant allows entry into a dreamlike portion of the city that is otherwise inaccessible. 

    • The smell of smoke predominates throughout Veil due to a curse that keeps a fire raging beneath the city streets.

Superhero Comics as RPG Fodder: The "Good Stuff" Versus Trash-Tier

I've got capes on the mind as I'm currently playing in a very fun superhero game. This is the result. Forgive me. The results may, in fact, be applicable to other genres, but this is what is rolling around in my head currently.

I have a theory about the difference between mining ideas from "good" superhero comics (I'm thinking high-minded stuff like Daredevil: Born Again, Watchmen, Seven Soldiers) and mining ideas from trash-tier superhero comics: trash-tier comics actually make for better rpg idea-mines than the good ones.

My thought is that the intricate clockwork of a densely plotted superhero comic would likely fall apart at the table because of two factors:

A) The randomness of dice rolls in most game systems

B) Players inevitably making insane choices that throw the whole schemata out of whack because that's just what players do

Ideas gleaned from trash-tier comics, on the other hand, are already surprisingly resilient to dumb rolls and dumber decisions because they come from a place of inspired stupidity. They roll with the punches, they bob and weave like a drunkard, but ultimately they get the job done.

If anything, I think superhero rpgs are potentially the place where dumb comic ideas go to be redeemed and born anew.

Ivahn Katavarg

The Silent Forest’s most powerful villain is Ivahn Katavarg, a feral lycanthrope bandit.

Ivahn Katavarg and his clan were inspired by the crimes attributed to Sawney Bean. Plus, I knew I wanted a werewolf villain available in Krevborna, so this is how I fit that in--perhaps in a semi-novel way.

Ivahn Katavarg

Ivahn Katavarg is the patriarch of a clan of inbred werebeasts who prey upon travelers of Krevborna’s roads. The Katavarg clan’s victims are robbed and often eaten. Some are taken back to the Katavarg’s lair, a primitive haven within a trap-laden cave complex in the Silent Forest, to serve as slaves and future meals.

Each member of the Katavarg family bears a curse that makes them transform into a werebeast a night. The curse takes a variety of forms; werebears, wereboars, and wererats all number among the clan. In his bestial form, Ivahn is a gray-furred werewolf.

Among his family, Ivahn Katavarg lives like a king. He keeps the choicest riches taken from the family’s victims for himself, and treats his many wives and children as servants and playthings. His base desires and sensual appetites are both colossal and monstrous.  

    • Appearance: He is a slovenly man, stout as a barrel but as strong as a beast—even in his human form.

    • Personality: His manners are coarse and he spares little thought for the wants and needs of others. 

    • Motive: He believes that growing fat upon what be pried from the fingers of others is preferable to honest work. 

    • Flaw: His love of secrecy is contested by his desire to be infamous and feared.

The Wychbog Cottage and Yrd Dolma

Below are two more adventure locations within Krevborna's Silent Forest. The first is an expression of fairy tale horror: a forboding cottage in the woods where a coven of three hags trade supernatural healing for the flesh of live children. The second is a more mystical area inspired by my love of the old Robin of Sherwood show and, oddly enough, Dark Souls.

The Wychbog Cottage

A tumble-down cottage perched atop creaking wooden supports emerges from a flooded fen in the Silent Forest; the cottage’s occupants, the Wychbog Sisters, are three ancient crones who can miraculously restore the health of those who dare to visit them.

    • The Wychbog Sisters are named Yubella Greentongue, Old Vasaga, and Mother Malaryn. 

    • All three sisters are corpulent and wear ragged dresses made of human skin, though they disguise their terrible natures under palatable illusions. 

    • When their aid is sought, the Sisters make their visitor a poisonous offer—they will cure whatever ailment besieges the sufferer, but in return that person must bring them a living child as payment. 

Yrd Dolma

Within an obscure clearing in the Silent Forest stands a circle of weathered gray sarsen stones known as Yrd Dolma. 

    • In the center of Yrd Dolma, a sacred bonfire is kept burning by blind pagans of the old faith. 

    • The druids give credence to a prophecy that states that a great warrior will one day willingly sacrifice themselves to their holy bonfire; this martyr will die upon the flames and be born again, emerging from immolation as a sacred undead champion.

    • The druidic priests of Yrd Dolma believe that their ordained champion is fated to free Krevborna from the grip of supernatural evil.

SATANICO PANDEMONIUM EDITION (it's free, like your mom)

It's gonna be a long four years, ain't it?

Between the threats of insane tariffs and other moves to destabilize the global economy, who knows what's gonna happen to the tabletop gaming industry.

Luckily, we can always DIY our good times.

To that end, below you'll find a link to PLANET MOTHERFUCKER: SATANICO PANDEMONIUM EDITION. This pdf contains the original PLANET MOTHERFUCKER zine and all four supplements for the game: BLACK SUNSHINE, DEMONOID PHENOMENON, DEAD GIRL SUPERSTAR, and PUSSY LIQUOR.

Oh, that last one doesn't sound familiar? That's because no one besides me has ever seen it.

Here's the link to PLANET MOTHERFUCKER: SATANICO PANDEMONIUM EDITION.

I'm making the game available to everyone who wants it, for free, in the spirit of "Fuck this nonsense, let's do fun shit with our friends just to spite every joyless moron trying to make the world a worse place." Yeah, that's right, a full game, a two-hundred page book, and you can just have it on the house. 

That said, if you want to buy me a beer in thanks, I wouldn't say no. Here's my Ko-fi virtual tip jar.

Fair warning: PLANET MOTHERFUCKER is not for everyone. It's brash, crass, and patently offensive--just like America, baby. It's a post-apocalyptic rpg that is a love letter to trash culture, a scathing take on the peculiar strain of homegrown American madness, and a sadly prescient comment on the ways things are going.

Oh, you want a print copy? Here are some instructions on how to make one yourself that you can get here.

You're welcome.

But seriously, if you wanna buy me a beer you can do it here--lord knows I'm gonna need it. It's gonna be a long four years, like I said up top.

Got questions? Want to say 'sup? Email totgad AT gmail DOT com

Old Sepulcher Road and the Seven Citadels

Two more adventure locations in Krevborna's Silent Forest. Old Sepulcher Road is my attempt at practicing what I preach: I think they idea of a "treacherous and/or haunted road" is under-utilized in world building. Part of the inspiration was passing a road called Hungry Hollow Road in my travels and being taken aback by how menacing that name was. The Seven Citadels is my nod to putting a little something into Krevborna for the sword & sorcery fans.

Old Sepulcher Road

Old Sepulcher Road cuts through Vargovishta Pass in the Karthax Mountains, stretching from Hemlock Hollow to the Silent Forest. 

    • The road is the hunting ground of the Bloody Bishop, a dullahan searching for his severed head. 

    • In life, the Bloody Bishop was a defrocked priest turned bandit who offered his victims no mercy. 

    • When he was captured by a local militia, he was tortured and decapitated—as an undead rider astride an undead steed, he  continues to terrorize the living.

The Seven Citadels

Seven tribes of heathen savages live within the Silent Forest. Each barbarous tribe’s territory centers around a tower of black stone that they both fear and protect from adventurers who wish to plunder the relics and ancient treasures within them.

    • The members of barbaric tribes decorate their skin with swirls of blue pigment; they practice cannibalism and ritual human sacrifice. 

    • The tribes’ territories encircle the black citadels, but even the most foolhardy tribal members never venture inside them to explore. 

    • Each citadel is the prison of one of the Fallen Lords—witch queens and princely warlocks who now exist only as shadowy wraiths lost to madness and despair.