World Building: The Desolation of Wij

A quick World Building exercise by rolling up the geography across a polyhedral map.

The Desolation of Wij
Four thousand square miles of harsh, arid land. Wij was in the past devastated. The living cling to the city state on the coast and eastern semi arid/marsh farmlands that produce rice. What tiny communities exist inland across the desolation are mining operations and oasis. There is the occasional ruined ancient fortress, but noone who ventures near such places returns.

Starting a Game
Located far from the coastal city is Iron-town, a tiny mining community,

Iron-Town
An asteroid crater several thousand feet across sits out in the desert. It is home to a few families involved in mining iron ore that is crushed to powder and separated out with a mill-wheel made of lodestone. The homes are located at the bottom of the crater and the mill up over the ridge atop a trail.

The four families
The four families are Raly, Funber-Trint, Trint, and Windle. They have been mining in the Crater for a few decades:

• The Funber-Trints are Magicusers and elves keeping that magic craft in the family. The elf Jayn Funber married her apprentice Kopin Trint causing a bit of a rift with the rest of the Trint clan. 
• The Trints are religious, god-fearing folk who are not all that happy with their magic wielding cousins.
• The Raly clan built the mill and have helped expand the mine workings benefiting the other three mining families.
• Windle are more farmers than miners but they put their time in down the mines because there is money in it.

Family
name                  race/class     starting PC                       bonus
Raly                    Dwarf           Dwarf                               warhammer
Funber-Trint    Half Elf         (Half-)Elf, Magic-user   lantern/continual light
Trint                   Human        Fighter, Thief, Cleric      holy symbol
Windle               Halfling       Halfling                            1 week iron rations

The mines
The mines are in a network of tunnels excavated from caves and fissures created by the asteroid hit lifting the surrounding rock.

Starting Adventure: the mine collapse
The PCs are putting in some time in the caves when a tremor shakes the mine and the entrance collapses. The pcs are trspped below ground with starting equipment and the only way out is to find an alternate route out through some unmapped fissure...

Linguistic Archaeology: Ancient Treasure Maps

The maps of Japanese language leads us to that inevitable word for treasure... Takara.

Japanese Words
Treasure   = Takara
Gold           = Gorudo
Tomb         = Haka
Mountain = Yama
Hill            = Oka
Coast         = Kaigan
Umbrella  = Kasa
Tiger         = Tora
Valley          = Tani
Bamboo   = Take
Ocean       = Kaiyo

We are confronted with a map. Located on an ocean coastline is a hill with a tomb (nearby, atop, or beneath the hill). Inland is a bamboo-filled valley.

At a point between the bamboo filled valley and the coastal hill-tomb is the treasure. Perhaps a tiger statue of gold or jade or stone, or it belongs to an individual named Tiger.

And there it is... a sort of treasure map. There is a lot of coastline in Asia. Japan, China, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Burma, Sumatra, Borneo... plenty of places to look and dig.

Basic Expert: Beholder-kin

|             2 Inches            |

The Beholder doesnt appear in BX D&D so these beholder-kin will be somewhat unique...

Occulus-Minor
Armor Class      7
Hit Dice              8**
Fly                       180' (60')
Attacks               1 bite, Special
Damage              1d4+see below
No. Appearing   1 (1)
Save As               Magicuser: 8
Morale                 8
Treasure              O(L)
Alignment           Chaotic

Notes: the lesser Occulus is a sentient leathery eyeball capable of flight that is perhaps a few inches in diameter with up to ten tiny eyes on eyestalks and a mouth filled with needle-like teeth. The eyestalks each have the ability to cast a single spell daily as a Necromancer (8th level magic-user): 3×1st, 3×2nd, 2×3rd, 2×4th level spells.
A Lesser Occulus is a form assumed by a 9th level Magicuser who uses an eyeball and brain tissue (their own) successfully enchanting it with all first to fourth level spells and applies an animate dead to the eye before they die. A successful wish transfering their conciousness. Usually Necromancers animate their remaining corpse as a Zombie Servitor.
Outside its lair, a lesser Occulus will be 1 in 20 chance carrying 1-4 gem stones in its maw, or be busily extorting gems from the PCs under threat of extermination. It might have a collection of numerous gems or even scrolls in its lair.

|         2 Inches × HD         |

Occulus-Draconis
Armor Class      as colour
Hit Dice              as HD
Fly                       240' (80')
Attacks               1 bite, breath, Special
Damage              as colour
No. Appearing   1 (1)
Save As               M-U Level: As HD
Morale                 as colour
Treasure              H
Alignment           Chaotic

Notes: An evil dragon will in a deal with a necromancer achieve an undead form similar to the Occulus-minor though much, much larger in size.



                                                                           Spell   No. Spells
Colour    AC    HD         Bite    Breath           levels: 1    2    3      ML
White     3       6***       2-16   80'×30' Cold cone    3    -     -          8
Black      2       7***       2-20   60'×5' Acid line        4    -     -          8
Green     1       8***       3-24   50'×40' Gas Cloud    3   3     -          9
Blue        0       9***       3-30   100'×5' lightning      4   4     -          9
Red         -1      10***     4-32   90'×30' fire cone      3    3    3        10

Art Folio: Pepper Potts

Not the Greatest drawing in the world but if you need a pen-drawn Pepper Potts, there she is.

Mystery Theatre: Building your own UFOs, sky minefields, and Fusion Bombs

As looked at during an examination of UFO sightings, the Idea of the hydrogen filled bladder coated in Radium paint crops up as a point of origin for the UFO mythos. This allows UFO builders to basically build a UFO 'framework' around their hydrogen bladder and let it drift around all 'glowing' at high altitudes being spotted by radar, and pulled along in slip streams, jet streams, microbursts, and other weather phenomenon.

This same technology can be applied to the creation of no fly zones. Hydrogen filled bladders with fine cable linking them to ground or other hydrogen bladders create an aerial hazard to aircraft meaning that for a few hundred dollars, billion dollar fighter jets can be torn apart by flying snags. The barrage balloon used so effectivly in WW1-WW2 to stop aircraft flying over Cities is a simple technology.

Then there is the other aspect of the technology. Because the radium coating decays producing particles and the bladder is raised in static potential several mega electron-volts a uranium atom within the balloon bladder would be excited to higher energy states and the radium decay products absorbed into the atom. So when it grounds the atom undergoes fusion as it collapses in energy state.


And the Government of Australia owes a bunch of school children an apology for intimidating them into silence over that Melbourne UFO landing in 1966. If you cant tell a fragmenting zeppelin from an alien interdimensional antigrav drive, you are not worth your citizenship.

Post Scarcity: The Gollywog is a corpse on which Startrek stands

Racism is founded in a psychosis that comes at us from superposition (the group conciousness, the parents in relation to the child, the past in relation to the future) and there is always an aspect of truth to anything that drives people insane. So What does a Gollywog represent? It represents fear. The Gollywog is a tall, male african american who is emaciated. An emaciated man in what is perceived as a world of plenty implying sickness and an insatiable, incurable hunger. Someone who will always be hungry. Sickness, illness, famine, and hunger.
And in that, there is an understanding that this individual is contaminated with something that causes an endless hunger. A disease, a virus, a parasite, a sickness, a bottomless pit, a man-made blackhole, the Singularity. And that in itself is a real possibility. So here in the cultural conciousness of the American People is horror and abomination. It represents something catastrophic. The Gollywog is Famine-incarnate. One of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
The Gollywog represents a famine in the deep recesses of the conciousness that drives Americans to achieve a post scarcity civilization, but it is also a famine that ultimately poisons the possibility of a post scarcity civilization.


If the Dream of the Startrek civilization is to be achieved, it requires sharing it with the emaciated and hungry so that they can see and share in the benefits of the Dream. Because if it isn't, we will be left holding emaciated corpses, and facing extinction.

Starfleet Shipyards: The Dadaelus Class Orbital Assembly

The decks shift orientation with the turbolift.

Orbital Assembly
Sphere and Cylinder: Launched as a single vehicle from the Moon, the sphere mounted above the Dish, it then proceeds to extend the turbolift separation gantry from the sphere and then the sphere turns ninety degrees aligning the turbolift gantry with its docking mate on the sphere allowing crews to move between the engineering section and sphere. The conventional launch motors are then ejected from the cylinder via the rear hatch, and returned to the lunar surface for re-use. The engineering section is then cleared for the insertion of the warp reactor assembly.

Warp Reactor Assembly: A massive single unmanned payload consisting of the warp core and and retracted nacelles was deployed to orbit in a launch configuration reminicent of the launch of the Phoenix. Lined up with the Dadaelus under construction it deploys its Nacelles and enters the Ship engineering Section by the exposed aft entry, the Nacelles sliding along their docking groove. The interior sleeve rotates, sealing the entry groove and allowing the lower engineering decks to pressurize. The Warp Core itself is in an unpressurized forward section of the Engineering hull.

Deck       Deployable Drop Habitat Deck Description
   A          Primary Bridge
   B          Medical Facilities & Science Labs
   C          Water Storage Tank & Food Supplies
   D          Deployable Drop Facility

Deck       Dadaelus Vessel Deck Description
   D          Secondary Bridge
   E          Crew Quarters
   F-L      Engineering Section
   F-H      Unpressurized Warp Reactor Section
   F          Anti-Proton Collector Assembly
   G          Reaction Chamber and Nacelle feeders
   H          Proton Collector Assembly
   I-L        Pressurized Section
   I           Warp Engine Capacitor Bank
   J-L        Long Storage Capacitor Gel
   L          Rear Warp Core Assembly Hatch