Maybe It's All the Cats

Going to write something smaller this week.  Started working on a script for a comic, which required a bit of research on a variety of things.  The inspiration for it is Stranger Things, Gravity Falls, and Hellboy.  Something magical, cosmic horror and weird.

Like going home.  So, let me ramble on something I've been thinking about.  Something about the nature of things like Stranger Things or the Dresden Files.  That Urban Fantasy pastiche.

Where Do the Monsters Live?

There is this idea in Urban Fantasy stories.   That they have to explain why monsters or fantastical elements remain hidden.  How have monsters or magic not become observed by the modern world? 

Each story does its own take on this.  Superhero stories use it as the basis for some heroes.  Some stories have clandestine wizards and vampires living secret society lives.  Others are dark things that have long slumbered that now have awakened. 

Stranger Things, Twin Peaks, etc., do that.  Horror loves dark alien things coming to life because someone went left instead of right.  The explanation is "it has always been here but secret."  It's still something the story sort explains to you.  It makes sure to cover the plot hole with the best kind of plywood it can.

It's like how a lot of Science Fiction stories have to explain their faster-than-light travel.  "Ships can't travel that fast" kills a lot of stories.  Something has to go up to explain it away.  If only to keep the plot hole wary from tripping over it. 

If you get stuck on it or need an answer for it, there's a chance you've gone ahead and missed the forest for the trees here.   Good stories make you never see the massive plot hole and good audiences know the hole is there.  They aren't stupid.  You cover it up when you have to or when it helps make the story better.

The best way I've handled this plot hole in stories is how I wrote them in my Noir Bedarte stories.  That Necromancy exists, and it happens.  That there is a young man wandering around, raising the dead.  And everyone accepts it with a bit of a "huh."

The Just-Over-There

 It isn't that there is a mystical thing blocking knowledge of it or some vast conspiracy.  It's more like regular people in such fantastical settings themselves aren't fantastical.  They have regular lives. 

They might not know about magic because, hell, most of us don't know what's going on with fashion in India.  Or what the slang for potato is in Australia.  They have lives to live and can't possibly know everything going in the world they live in.  It's the world.  Have you seen it?  It's huge.

I like this kind of hand waving.   Because it moves the explanation to some sort of blendy, mist-filled possible realm.  A place called "just-over-there."

Just-Over-There is the land you come into whenever you turn off the lights at night and look into a dark room.  That moment when the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, looking in the dark, that's the Just-Over-There. 

Or when you are in a new place, lost, and every building looks the same.  That's the Just-Over-There too. 

Or that dream you wake up from that was so real, so true you can't help but think you were awake.  But instead, you wake up, wondering how you got back into your bed.  That's the Just-Over-There again.

I think that Just-Over-There is a valid part of our imaginations.  Like an evolutionary adaptation.  People who could imagine potential danger lurking the dark outlived those who didn't.  Fear and imagination.  Primal things that still come through.

End Ramble

So that's one of the ideas I'm thinking of while writing this current comic script.  Trying to imagine and fill out a setting.  One that has fantastical elements that feel like they crept in from some corner that looks like our own. 

Oh and cats.  Been doodling a bunch of cats for it too.

I do not know if I'll post it here.  The current goal is to see if I can do a whole process of Script to Comic Page on my own.  I've done both separately, never together. 

A Wizard's Bullet Journal

Nadia's head was in her red leather spellbook again.

The wizard had sat down after their fight with the goblins in the cave.  She had started to pen quick notes.  Her inkwell was out and she laid flat on her stomach, writing a tiny script in the blue book.

The rest of the party down looked at the purple-robed wizard, waiting.

"You done yet?"  Bellum, the paladin asked.  Their impatient tone didn't seem to register with Nadia at all.

"Have to add a note or three,"  Nadia replied as she noted down observations from the last spell she'd cast in combat.  "My last casting of Magic Missile was different than previous.  And I might've perfected the force application equation.  At least the light refraction seemed to bear that out."

"What does that mean?"

"Her magic was greener than it's been before,"  Hensam added.  She took the moment of quiet to shine her daggers.

Bellum shot her a glare.  Nadia beamed.  Well, she sort of beamed, her face still buried in the notes she was making.

"You noticed too!  Oh, Good!"  Nadia closed her spellbook, her fingers stained purple with ink.  "This adventure has revealed much about evocation to me.   Can't wait to experiment with more spells!"

Bellum sighed, pinching their nose.  "We're trying to save the village from that black dragon."

"Oh, I hope so!  It will be fascinating to seeing how evocation magic interacts with the dragon's natural magical resistance, Bellum.  Let me know if you notice anything in particular and I'll make sure to credit you later."

"Wizards,"  Bellum growled.

For the Crafty Wizard

One of the first notions I got after starting my own bullet journal was how useful it could be in a tabletop RPG as a prop.  Bullet Journals are a thing from 2015, based on a core idea of an analog planning method.  I tend to think of it as something that ideas and thoughts can be offloaded onto.   Y'know, rather than taking up free space in your own brain.

The phrase "operating system for your journal" also is a phrase people use for it.  IDK how to explain them here, as they aren't the point.

One of my first ideas for adopting a Bullet Journal (or Bujo) is for use by a Wizard.  Or any magic-user.  It might've been idea 10, who knows.  I get lots of these.

What if a Wizard had an actual, physical real-world journal that the player at the table used?  Or any character that casts spells.  Or a Bard's songs.  Or a Paladin's oaths.  This starts from a Wizard thing, but if the character is a "writer" it could fit for them too.  It being a Bujo simplifies the usage, gives them a structure to make it with and expand it.

Every Spell A Collection

The simple parts of a Bujo are some of the modules.  The easiest to adopt is the first: an Index.  Number pages and make the first section of the Journal the Index.  By recording what each section is, the Bujo Wizard (Journamancer?) has a structure that can make the journal prop go from blank paper to something you can actually fill as needed.

The second module useful for the Spellbujo is using Collections.  Collections are just that, collected pages around one subject or thing.  Often people use them to record what books they've read, their budget, for example. Or any of the other random crafty Instagram photos you'll find of Bujos.  We can use Collections like that.  Except each collection is a spell the Wizard would have in their in-game Spellbook.

My thought is each spell should be 2 pages, but each Wizard is unique.  The Conjuror will want several pages on various summonings.  Meanwhile, a Necromancer will want a collection for each corpse they animate.  That's the personalizing part of this of it.

I'm hinting at it here, but each Spell's collection shouldn't only be a written copy of the spell in question.  But it could!  Maybe it couldn't as well.  Who knows.  Depends on how useful you want to make the prop.  Add salt as needed.

My thought is for the Journaling Wizard is for them to use a memorable casting of a spell as a chance to add something.  An observation or addendum to a particular spell's collection.  Y'know.  Magic science notes.

And a good GM, regardless of System, should ask to look at the Spellbook from time to time.  They could offer to let the Wizard alter spells based on their character's observations.  The GM might notice how often the Wizard uses a particular Abjuration.  How the Wizard's notes keep wondering about its use for something different.  Something not in the core books of whatever system they're running.

The GM should alter the spell and give the player the chance to alter their spells through this.  If the player puts in the idea fodder, go with it.  Or not.  Just a thought.

A Clever Bit of Artifice

So this is the fun bit.  Even a bit of work turns the real world journal into the Wizard's Spellbook.  This Prop itself lends itself to dramatically opened, flipped through hurriedly, or whatever motion you could do with a prop at the table.  Play with it.  Some groups might have a grand time with that.

But it gets a bit better than that, I think.  If done right, an old spellbook might outlast the campaign.  In a future campaign, it might return.  The GM might ask for it, and then suddenly, your old Wizard's book is an important plot device in the next generation's adventures.  That book might spend years as a prop, earning its wages as a spellbook.

It also gives you something to remember a good campaign with.  That's another thing.  Sometimes we don't remember the good campaigns.  They end before their time.  Sometimes having some small thing of it in the real world is worth it.

Or not.

Depends on how you write it down, I suppose.

Reading Materials: Thoughts on Field of Blood

There is a thing that happens with history, where it becomes mythologized.  I have my own framing for it when historical figures go from being human to being part of some story.  They become the Gods, Heroes or Monsters.  We don't often think of them as people anymore.  Instead, we identify them in less specific ways, some of which might not be true.  Or worse, might be half-true.

The Field of Blood

The recent book in my craw is The Field of Blood by Joanne B. Freeman.  It covers a part of the Antebellum period of the US, the decades before the Civil War.  Its focus is on violence in Congress.  This is something you might've thought happened only once or twice in US history before the Civil War.  Most likely you'd be thinking of the Caning of Charles Sumner, but The Field of Blood reveals much more tarnish view.

It strings together a history of duels, intimidation and open brawls on the floor of Congress.  Key is the word 'Strings.'  Because such violence isn't something we Americans seem to remember about those years.  In fact, the Antebellum period seems to be this sort of blank spot in the American mind.  We can remember only certain things from it.  All cast by the lens of Lincoln and the rest of the 19th Century that followed antebellum.  Biased without seeing the stains.

Antebellum Abuses

This is a period of US History I'm fascinated with.  I've written my own fantasy setting that pulls from it rather than the latter parts of the 1800s.  Y'know, the difference between the "wild west" we whites fantasize about.  Or that steampunk-ish period prior to World War 1.  The one that seems to catch the dreamer's mind, while forgetting all the imperialism.  I find the 1830s, 1840s, and 1850s, interesting because of the dark marks they have.

The 1830s saw the advent of the photograph.  In 1830, the United States had almost no rails.  By 1840, railroads connected most of the east coast together.  Humans were unkind and cruel to animals; often it was a form of entertainment for many places.  We engaged in chattel slavery, which we still seem unable to digest the consequences of.  People found industry wanting and started to romanticize about something new.

In other words, it was a dark time and it was a new age.  What always fascinates me is those voices then that were trying to do what they thought was right.  Even if it was immoral by our standards.  The revealing framing of The Field of Blood is how much honor culture factored in.  It suggested a strategy for the South of threats and violence against the North to get what they wanted.  Yet, Southern violence, when used over and over again, didn't create a docile North.  Instead, violence and dueling only seemed to do the opposite.  It made aggression between both sides more palpable and certain.

The thing that struck me the most was John Quincy Adams.  Adams is largely a forgettable US President.   One doesn't remember him right away.  If one does, it's as the last President elected before suffrage expanded.  Albeit only to all non-landowning white men.  After being President, John Quincy Adams became a member of the House of Representatives.  Which, by today's standards, feels like a demotion.

But his tenure there was shockingly impressive to me.  Adams, in a place where Southerners threatened violence all the time, challenged them right to their faces.  An old man.  He opposed them out of the simple principle that it wasn't right that Northern people had their representatives silenced.  I hadn't known that, and my context for him bumped my opinion of him up in my mind.

Yell, But Never Be Silent

I found The Field of Blood insightful.

The revelation of the violence in Congress during the Antebellum period struck me as a relief.  That there were flaws amongst the leading politicians of that leaden age.  That the Civil War wasn't born out of some flickering moment.  It was the opening of the old wound, that had festered and never healed fully.  If anything, it says something about political discourse.  If you lack the will to fight for what you believe, then what is the point of politics?  Or better yet: in no age are political battles won with civility.

It is almost never about coming together.  It's about making something more of what we have.  And yes, you aren't the only one scared of the other side.  But you still are willing to talk, even if it is yelling.

The Vengeant (A Flavor Reskin for Barbarians in D&D/Pathfinder)

Golga hid in the darkest corner she could find.  The little girl squeezed into the furthest, hardest to reach a corner of the pantry.  The raiders couldn't find her here.  She hoped they couldn't.  Golga shivered; her cotton shift had turned red from the all the blood.  It was cold.  She was cold.

"Don't find me.  Don't find me.  Don't find me."  She chanted to herself, over and over.  Golga had seen what they'd done.  They'd be gone.  Soon.  Maybe.  Maybe not.  Or they would kill her.

A voice in the dark startled her.  It was soothing.  It reminded her of her mother, but after she had caught Golga doing something she wasn't supposed to it.  Anger vibrated in it.

"What if you found them first?"

"What?"  Golga replied.  "They'll kill me."

"Not if you kill them first."  A face seemed to melt out of the darkest before her.  Eyeless, it still looked at her.  "Anger.  Fury.  Golga, aren't you angry?"

"Yes... but I am small."

"And they killed your family.  They think they can stop you.  I am Vengeance.  I am Fury.  Take my gift.  Let the Rage flow, child."

When Golga woke up, she still was covered in blood.  But five corpses were before her.  All of the raiders that had attacked her village, dead.  She looked at her fingers, at the knife.  Trembling she dropped it.  She trembled because that rage she had felt, didn't bring her shame. 

The vengeance made the child feel complete.  Yet Golga knew there was much more to do with it. 

Vengeance's Scions

Spirits of Vengeance, sometimes called Furies, are entities that have existed since before civilization began.  The first murder birthed them.  Or so the story goes.  They themselves don't directly assault or hunt the wicked unless there is no other recourse.  But often these Furies have done something else.  They spark a fire in the hearts of those victimized.

The Furies exist to punish wickedness.  They are incapable of seeing redemption in others.  They are not merciful.  Some Spirits of Vengeance fall, but often are destroyed if they fall.  Mercy or worse, enabling the guilty to commit evil again, can cause a Fury to fall from their power. 

Most often Furies craft scions, inheritors of the unending Wrath all Spirits of Vengeance tap into.  When a Fury does this, it touches the heart.  They put a spark of themselves, enough to let that soul tap into the Wrath.  To let them do a small, milder version of the fury all Spirits of Vengeance draw power from: Rage.

Raging

They go by many names, but often the words given to those of the furious path speaks of condescension.  Barbarian.  Savage.  Thug.  Brute.  The name the wise and those who know their hearts calls them reveals a bit of truth.  The Vengeant.

Spirits of Vengeance gift them, not just in physical ways, but with a deeper spiritual bond.  The dark spirits of vengeance are said to have trained the First Vengeant.  An lone child who survived the brutal genocide of his people.  Their anger led them deep into the pits of Hell.  To the screeching halls of Darkest Nicht. Through the endless prison-mazes of Urdam and many other brutal places.  Their rage broke the universe and never could satisfy them.  But it gave them a grim purpose.

Savagery

This is a different path than those who learn traditional martial arts or magecraft.  Because it is given by a spirit, some consider it to be the purview of the primitive or the uncivilized.  Furies care not for whoever it is their gift with rage.  They empower anyone victimized with the power to seek their own vengeance. 

This savage path can end in multiple ways for the Vengeant.  Their vengeance ended, the Rage that burns from it might fade.  If they finally find justice, it might turn into something for others, to do as the Furies did unto them.  Others instead become the same kind of monsters that created them.  Still, others never find satisfaction and die sooner than someone who left it.

Furies often empower the young or those in a position that no other could aid them.  A rare few seek out Spirits of Vengeance and convince them to give them access to the Rage.

Over time, a few Vengeants even learn to master the Rage.  They turn it into power that rivals the terrible might of the Furies.  Hulking strength.  Unstoppable wrath.  Earthshaking power.

Metagame Notes

This is mostly a flavor thing.  The Fury could use the stats for any low-level-ish Devil or Angel if you need a place to start for that. Overall, the Vengeant concept is intended to replace the normal Barbarian flavoring.

Classes reflect a kind of stereotype.  It's meant to be a starting place for creating a character.  The Rogue is the classic thief in fantasy, or the Paladin is the classic good-natured knight, for example.  The classic Barbarian, though, has always troubled me a bit. 

The implication of "primitive tribes" or "barbarian peoples" implies a lack of empathy.   The "Noble Savage" as a stereotype is flawed for many reasons.  The downward look at anyone who doesn't act or look like your culture.   Even in cloying words, it's problematic. 

The word Barbarian reflects a Greek concept.  The Ancient Greeks coined the term.  Because of the sounds, they perceived foreigners made.  "Bar-bar."  Y'know, because Greeks.  It became an antonym for civilized.  Thus it's implied an entire class that represents an "uncivilized people."

There is a problem with calling one culture primitive.  After one gets past the problem of who gets to call who "primitive", there are other concerns.  Are Barbarians in a setting foreigners?  Are they primitive from a choice?  What does primitive mean?  Does eschewing armor make you primitive or poor?

In other words, the noble savage also is less interesting than the Vengeant.  If anything, it's because the motivations are more interesting.  It doesn't imply a "primitive" culture based on dated stereotypes.  But it does give a character a goal to look for.  It creates actionable goals.  It opens the door for players to explore questions on whether vengeance is worth it, or if it is something to fear.