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    Canonfire :: View topic - How many spaceships visited Oerth?
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    How many spaceships visited Oerth?
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    Journeyman Greytalker

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    Fri Apr 03, 2009 6:30 pm  
    How many spaceships visited Oerth?

    Hello

    Usually I'd be one not to mix sci-fi and fantasy, but in my current Greyhawk campaign I'm considering it. Actually, I'm quite excited about the idea. Happy

    I was just wondering if a Greyhawk loremaster out there would be able to help me sift through the various bits of lore TSR has published regarding spaceships and D&D over the years and how they could possibly interconnect with each other and what role in Greyhawk they could play.

    I've made a list of possible resources below that I'd like to investigate. I haven't read these products yet but, correct me if I'm wrong, here's the gist of them:

    - S3 Expedition to the Barrier Peaks
    Details a crashed spacecraft in the Barrier Peaks. Is this related to the Warden, the City of the Gods or the Egg of Coot?

    - C1 The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan
    Refers to the Warden II of Metamorphosis Alpha. How many Wardens were there?

    - DA3 City of the Gods
    A Basic D&D product for the Mystara world but could be adapted to GH. Is this another Warden that made it's way to Oerth?

    - Tale of the Comet boxed set
    This was released for 2E and involves the investigation of a crashed spaceship. The craft is only a small scout ship but it has a portal in it which leads to adventures on space stations, etc. beyond. The adventure doesn't seem to be tied to a specific TSR setting but is there any way it could be related to the spaceships of GH?

    More products for reference:

    - Metamorphosis Alpha campaign (various editions)

    - Star Frontiers setting
    Is there anything in this setting that links to Metamorphosis Alpha, the City of the Gods, the spaceship of S3, etc?

    - Alternity: Star*Drive setting
    Same as above.

    - Gamma World
    Could this setting also tie-in somehow?

    This is all a lot to digest, but is there anything that could be pulled from these classic TSR sci-fi settings to explain the origins of things such as the spaceship of S3, the Warden that allegedly visited Tamoachan and the City of the Gods?

    I guess I'm trying to piece together a believable story behind the various spaceships that have visited GH. Smile
    Adept Greytalker

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    Fri Apr 03, 2009 10:03 pm  
    Relationships with Gamma World and Star Frontiers

    If you look at:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma_World

    and:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Frontiers

    you'll see that Gamma World from 1978 has "Player characters in both games, for instance, have six Attributes rated on a scale of 3 to 18, randomly generated by rolling six-sided dice. Four of those abilities (Charisma, Constitution, Dexterity, and Intelligence) have the same name and functions in both games, and the Physical Strength and Mental Strength attributes in Gamma World closely parallel Strength and Wisdom in D&D."

    and Star Fontiers from 1982 "was a percentile-based system and used only 10-sided dice (d10). Characters had attributes rated from 1-100 (usually in the 25-75 range) which could be rolled against for raw-attribute actions such as lifting items or getting out of the way of falling rocks. There were eight attributes that were paired together (and shared the same rating to begin with)—Strength/Stamina, Dexterity/Reaction Speed, Intuition/Logic, and Personality/Leadership."

    Interestingly, Star Fontiers' "races were altered slightly and reused in TSR's Spelljammer [an AD&D 2E setting]."

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelljammer
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    Fri Apr 03, 2009 10:29 pm  

    Long response:

    I did a campaign based on the various spaceship incidents once, but with less research than you are asking. Now I'm going to rectify that. First, unless you intend to take the campaign into space it's obviously best to keep your answers vague (X-Filesy) but I understand the need for consistency in the plot. Anyhoo, having never actually played Metamorphosis Alpha (but I did play Gamma World) I started here to learn more on its background.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphosis_Alpha

    Quote:
    In 1980 TSR released AD&D module S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. The module was based on the idea that a starship such as the Warden (though not the Warden itself, according to Gary Gygax) became marooned in a D&D universe. In the module's foreword, Gygax writes that the module was written to introduce Metamorphosis Alpha to the wider D&D audience and to demonstrate how one might undertake science fiction/fantasy crossover.


    IIRC the S3 ship was a research vessel that collected specimens or whatnot. If it was named the Warden then that could be construed that it was just one of many sub-vessels that belonged to the greater Warden 'World-ship' of the MA setting. Even the 'Warden II' mentioned in Tamoachan could be from the same source, sent to the tropical region for specimens or to locate Warden (I). This implies then that you could have Warden III, IV and so on as well.

    Quote:
    The original edition of the game takes place on the generation spaceship Warden that has been struck by an unknown cataclysmic event that killed many of the colonists and crew. Thus, the role-players must survive their missions in this ship (which they believe to be a world) where they no longer understand the technology around them and they encounter numerous mutated creatures. In essence, Metamorphosis Alpha is a dungeon crawl in space.


    Since the set up for the MA setting is a catastrophy similar to the set up for Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, then perhaps the 'Wardens' were jettisoned to save specimens or to escape whatever horrors were going on in the World Ship. Looking at the intro for MA, things become more intriguing:

    Quote:
    INTRODUCTION
    Mankind’s urge to explore and expand its frontiers finally caused another push into the vastness of space - first interplanetary, then interstellar. By the 23rd Century a great migration wave was spreading from Old Terra to the hundreds of inhabitable worlds which had been discovered in the Milky Way galaxy. During the next hundred years colonization ships of all types and descriptions went out to the stars, bearing seedling colonies seeking a better life. Many found their new homes - for better or for worse - but for one reason or another scores of these starships never
    reached their destination. This game is based on just such an event, the fate of a colony ship which became lost...
    The starship Warden was created from the designs used in the United Western Starship Cartel program, and it was laid down in the Trans-Plutonian Spaceyards in 2277. The design was the most ambitious ever attempted, the blueprints calling for an oval spheroid of tremendous size using a new metal alloy of tensile strength previously unknown. The ship was an incredible 50 miles in length, with a width of 25 miles, and a height of eight and one-half miles. Additional levels above and below the central one brought the total number of decks to 17. Warden required 11 years to complete, and it did not leave the Sol System until 2290 because of the effort required to outfit the starship. The vessel contained complete Terran environments, and the colonists were not rigidly screened for the expedition, for it was held that Warden’s accommodations would place few physical or psychological stresses upon colonist or crewman.


    Now at first IMC, I had assumed the City of the Gods in Greyhawk could be the same ship from DA3, the source for the S3 crash on so on. Now I'm wondering some different scenarios. The shape of the ship in MA suggests one of your other elements, The Egg of Coot. Well a 50 mile wide, 8 mile tall ship wouldn't be easy to bury, except in a swamp perhaps. If that is so, you could have the whole Warden setting on Oerth. If you stick with the MA setting's contention that the ship is still autopiloting itself to avoid planets and suns, then the EoC could be a byproduct of the CotG instead.
    The CotG in DA3 iirc is not an ovoid but something more traditionally shaped for a scifi-fantasy vessel that it looks 'city-like' when grounded. Maybe the CotG is A) A wholly different world-ship that ran into the same anamoly leading to Oerth, or B) It is a complete deck of the vast ovoid Warden that broke up on entry. Thus the EoC could also be a part of the ship (MA has a dome level at it's top for instance).
    Another direction could be the EoC is really a colonization engine/robot dropped from the S3 crash and somehow "built" the CotG acting on programming once it made planet-fall. And with that, populated the city with second generation automatons (which i think coincides with an article by RJK about Mordenkainen and Robilar's journey there). Another detail that would fit nicely with another published mod involving automatons, Wolfgang Baur's Raiders of the Black Ice from Dungeon Magazine.

    Sidebar, depending on your timeline, it would be fun to say the Blackmoorians are descended human survivors of whatever wrecks you go with. (I think that's what I did IMC)

    To answer the rest of your post:

    Star Frontiers. I am hazy on the backstory but it's clearly a universe were the colonies of man succeed and mingle with other races. You could trace MA and S3 back to here if your goal is to play SF.

    Alternity: No idea. It came much later than these other settings, I'd avoid it.

    Gamma World: This I think was set up as the Earth left behind by the world ships like Warden. I could be wrong but MA was the precursor for GW so they make the best fit obviously. This would be more fun IMO than tracing steps back to SF.

    Tales of the Comet: I have no idea, but I'm sure it could make a good X-factor if you want. A second or third encounter so to say if Oerth turns out to be this great technology sargasso that it seems to be (One need only look to the Jungle of Lost Ships for that reference).

    I have one last bit of spaceship lore to throw out that you missed: In the City of Greyhawk Box Set (I think elsewhere too), there is reference to the 'Silver Metal Cairn'.
    Quote:
    A cairn in the Cairn Hills is actually the sleek vessel of a young god, killed when his ship crashed as a falling star to Oerth. It has never been located. some claim that this is the Silver Metal Cairn. (Can be confirmed)

    Quote:
    One, allegedly discovered long ago but since then its location has again become a mystery , is reputed to be a long, metal cylinder. Its surface is a type of steel far superior to any known in the Flanaess, and it is filled with a variety of deadly traps that can confound the most astute of thieves and defeat the most diligent of magical detections. However, the few items brought forth from that cairn sold for fabulous prices, due more to their uniqueness than any intrinsic properties. These items have long been dispersed among the nobles, wizards, and sages of the central Flanaess.
    Legends claim that this is a cairn of the gods, descended from the stars to reward the people of Oerth. Diligently searching PCs might be able to discover the whereabouts of one or two of the artifacts from this cairn, if they really set out to investigate these stories. The location of the cairn itself- reportedly much of it was never explored-remains a deeper mystery.


    I love this facet of GH lore. Enjoy!
    Journeyman Greytalker

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    Sat Apr 04, 2009 3:46 pm  

    Thanks for the excellent and informative posts.

    This gets some ideas brewing.

    I notice in the MA intro you quoted, it says: "By the 23rd Century a great migration wave was spreading from Old Terra to the hundreds of inhabitable worlds which had been discovered in the Milky Way galaxy."

    This fits well with the timeline of Gamma World. According to Wikipedia, "The first two editions place the final war in the years AD 2309-2322, and ascribe the final annihilation to a terrorist group called 'The Apocalypse'."

    So I like your idea that the Warden/s came from Earth - fleeing the destruction of their planet by nuclear holocost.

    The ship that visited Tamoachan, the ship of S3, the Egg of Coot, the City of the Gods, the Silver Metal Cairn could have all been colonization craft from Gamma World that got sucked through some blackhole phenomena to the Greyhawk universe.

    Also, I think if the PCs traced back the origins of one of these craft - perhaps the vessel returns to it's original world - then Gamma World would be a great fit. By the sounds of the original incarnation of the setting, it is more of a pulp sci-fi/fantasy setting which wouldn't be too jarring for the PCs to visit. In other worlds, they'll find stuff like power armour and lasers but the game isn't too hung up on the science of things.

    I like this idea.

    But this now leads me to the daunting task of collecting Gamma World and Metamorphosis Alpha products because I'm a completionist! Smile
    GreySage

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    Sat Apr 04, 2009 5:03 pm  

    Aeolius chronicles references to time travel on Oerth in this thread; relevant here is the metal ship with neither mast nor oars found in the Jungle of Lost Ships described in the Glossography. This might be another crashed spaceship.

    There are also the "sheens" introduced in Dragon #258 and Dragon #270, which were explicitly tied to Greyhawk:

    "At least two points of origin for machine life cysts are currently known, the Barrier Peaks and the Rael cysts. Many more are suspected to exist, but they are as yet undiscovered." - Dragon #258, page 30. I assume the Rael cyst is a reference to Tale of the Comet.

    The S3 ship, which was a modular section of a larger ship afflicted by a plague, ended up in Oerth's universe after falling through a black hole. What this hole in the fabric of time and space looks like on Oerth's side is unknown, but it can't be another black hole, or the ship would have been drawn immediately back into the gravity well. A very strong candidate is the Sisters, a mysterious "constellation" of nine starlike objects in Greyspace (described in the sourcebook of that name) that functions as a gateway to other times and places. Perhaps the Sisters, and the offending black hole, are also the source of the other technological incursions. Possibly the other crashes are other sections of the S3 exploration-colonization vessel.

    Fred Weining's article on the Archbarony of Blackmoor in the Oerth Journal #5 suggested that the Egg of Coot was actually the same Egg of Coot from the Mystara/Blackmoor setting, who had fled Mystara to Oerth after the Rain of Fire that destroyed the Blackmoor civilization. Similarities between Mystara's Blackmoor and Oerth's Blackmoor (for example, a City of the Gods in both) are blamed on the Egg of Coot, who has been secretly influencing events for thousands of years in order to make his new home more like his old one.
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    Sun Apr 05, 2009 1:54 am  

    rasgon wrote:
    "At least two points of origin for machine life cysts are currently known, the Barrier Peaks and the Rael cysts. Many more are suspected to exist, but they are as yet undiscovered." - Dragon #258, page 30. I assume the Rael cyst is a reference to Tale of the Comet.


    Ah ha! I knew there'd be a Tale of the Comet link somewhere. I shall seek out this issue. Smile

    One thing I love about S3 is the strange looking high-tech weapons. They were designed to throw players off on how to use them (ie. to avoid players meta-gaming with their real world knowledge). The disadvantage to these strange-looking weapons, however, is that they don't fit well with the high-tech weapons of City of the Gods and Tale of the Comet.

    If memory serves me correctly, the weapons of these two adventures are more your traditional looking sci-fi weapons; ie. a blaster rifle actually looks like a high-tech rifle with handle and trigger.

    In order to connect S3 to the City of the Gods, the Warden and Tale of the Comet, I think the weapons would have to be changed to more traditional-looking types.
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    Thu Apr 09, 2009 9:33 pm  

    I've been doing some research on Gamma World and Star Frontiers and found 2 interesting pieces:

    1) The semi-pro Gamma World fan module "Omega Project" (Module GW11) links the Starship Warden to Gamma World. I know it's not official but it's done well.

    In the original Metamorphosis Alpha product, the mutations that occurred on the Warden were the result of the ship travelling through radioactive mist. If the Warden is a colony ship leaving Gamma World, perhaps an alternative explanation is that a terrorist of The Apocalyse (the ones who released the nuclear and biological agents on Earth to create the blasted and radioactive Gamma World) stowed away on the Warden and released the same radioactive and biological agents to cause the wide-spread mutations on the ship? This would tie in better I think. Radioactive mists that cause the same mutations as on Gamma World is too much of a coincedence I think. (Perhaps the agents of The Apocalyse follow Tharizdun in one of his many multiversal guises?)

    2) The Star Frontiers map of the Frontier (Known Space) in "Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space" has a region in the top right-hand corner that is called the Xagyg Nebulae. Did Zagig travel to the Star Frontier's universe and name a nebulae after himself? Perhaps this nebulae is like a Bermuda Triangle in space and ships travelling through it risk the chance of been sucked away to alternate dimensions like the Greyhawk universe?

    Just some musings . . .
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    Fri Apr 10, 2009 4:40 pm  

    The City of the Gods is the USS Beagle in Blackmoor.
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    Fri Apr 10, 2009 9:27 pm  

    Good catch Keolander, I had forgot the name of that ship. Taken as canon you'd have to assume the Beagle and Warden/s are entirely different phenomenons. Then throw in the Silver Metal Cairn, the Sheens and more like the 'alien' Olman gods (trapped here too?) and you have a very space littered Oerth indeed.

    Quote:
    The Star Frontiers map of the Frontier (Known Space) in "Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space" has a region in the top right-hand corner that is called the Xagyg Nebulae

    Wow, I never knew SF went there although I shouldn't be surprised.
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    Mon Apr 13, 2009 6:50 pm  

    The CotG is a survey ship from a massively bureaucratic galaxy-spanning empire that was surveying the world Dave put Blackmoor on when it went down. The Temple of the Frog is a related Blackmoor module where on of the survivors kinda goes off and violates the Prime Directive and tries to take over the area around the CotG. The Egg isn't related to the CotG in any way. This data comes from the new "Dave Arenson's Blackmoor" material published in the last couple of years. I figure if you want to know what the deal is, go with the guy that wrote it even if this version isn't strictly cannon.

    The Warden IS related directly to GW in a time line published in Dragon back when it had the ARES Si-Fi gaming section in the back. If E.G.G. says the S3 ship isn't the Warden then I guess it isn't. But the preface of S3 does have the story of the ship, the plague, and the separation. If one segment made the trip through a black hole, it could have easily had company in the form of other segment that landed in, say the Carin Hills.

    Another really interesting point. Did anyone ever notice that in the picture book that comes with S3, the door that the players enter through is at the bottom of a very tall wall of exposed spaceship? The players enter on level one and all following levels are lower than the entry point, yet there is clearly more ship ABOVE the players too. One could likely access those areas via the iris valves sealing off the top of the drop tubes on level 1.
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    Mon Apr 13, 2009 9:49 pm  

    Free_City_Assassin wrote:
    The CotG is a survey ship from a massively bureaucratic galaxy-spanning empire that was surveying the world Dave put Blackmoor on when it went down. The Temple of the Frog is a related Blackmoor module where on of the survivors kinda goes off and violates the Prime Directive and tries to take over the area around the CotG. The Egg isn't related to the CotG in any way. This data comes from the new "Dave Arenson's Blackmoor" material published in the last couple of years. I figure if you want to know what the deal is, go with the guy that wrote it even if this version isn't strictly cannon.


    Aha! And I own that newest Blackmoor book too, forgot! :P

    Quote:
    The Warden IS related directly to GW in a time line published in Dragon back when it had the ARES Si-Fi gaming section in the back. If E.G.G. says the S3 ship isn't the Warden then I guess it isn't. But the preface of S3 does have the story of the ship, the plague, and the separation. If one segment made the trip through a black hole, it could have easily had company in the form of other segment that landed in, say the Carin Hills.


    I'm inclined to agree. It is no coincidence and it can be explained somehow.

    Quote:
    Another really interesting point. Did anyone ever notice that in the picture book that comes with S3, the door that the players enter through is at the bottom of a very tall wall of exposed spaceship? The players enter on level one and all following levels are lower than the entry point, yet there is clearly more ship ABOVE the players too. One could likely access those areas via the iris valves sealing off the top of the drop tubes on level 1.


    Now that's a shrewd observation. I may have to dig out the ol mod and look at the art now that you mention it.
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    Mon Apr 13, 2009 10:45 pm  

    If the Sisters constellation were, in fact the term end of a black hole, then all of these extemporaneous spaceships and star-faring relics are easily explained.

    Doubly so, considering that Oerth is at the center of its respective Crystal Sphere. Speaking of which, I hereby posit something along these lines:

    There are two realities, one magical / one mundane. In our world, space is a vast thing, solar systems are star-centric, and magic isn't 'real'. On the other side of things, you have the phlogiston and crystal spheres, and magic is very much real.

    There various ways between these two realities. All 'magical' means, such as gates and portals actually originate on the magical side of the curtain. On the mundane side, however, if there is a 'gate' that originates from that side, it does so as a black hole.

    Just a thought.
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    Tue Apr 14, 2009 11:07 am  

    The problem with the Phlogiston model ala Spelljammer is the fact that, IIRC, there is no Mars (aka Barsoom) near Oerth. There would be no logical way to explain Eracs Cousin's adventures on Barsoom from the original Greyhawk Campaign.

    As for the Egg of Coot, I don't remember 'it' being connected in any way with the City of the Gods/USS Beagle. That wouldnt make sense as 'its' powers are nothing like Stephen Rocklin or the other crew members of the Beagle. The Egg also has a vulgar sense of humour that involves things like rotten eggs and crap of that nature (I know because I played a High Thonian Noble/Fighter in the Blackmoor RPGA campaign).
    GreySage

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    Tue Apr 14, 2009 11:21 am  

    Keolander wrote:
    The problem with the Phlogiston model ala Spelljammer is the fact that, IIRC, there is no Mars (aka Barsoom) near Oerth. There would be no logical way to explain Eracs Cousin's adventures on Barsoom from the original Greyhawk Campaign.


    I think when a character is randomly astrally projected to another planet after looking at it, "logic" isn't really the issue. One thing notably missing from that adventure (and its inspiration, Princess of Mars) is a logical explanation.

    It'd be more logical if he found a portal in a dungeon (or some other planar-travel device was invented), in which case Erac's Cousin could have ended up anywhere in the multiverse, phlogiston or not.

    The phlogiston doesn't become an issue unless Erac's Cousin moves outside the solar system, which in the original campaign he didn't. This is less of an issue with the Spelljammer cosmology than with the fact that Greyspace is painfully bereft of Barsooms.

    However, I added several Barsoom-like moons to various planets in my own version of Greyspace. Gnibile is especially good for this, since it happens to be red.
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    Tue Apr 14, 2009 2:59 pm  
    Oerth vs. Earth

    I get the impression that what we think of Oerth isn't the Oerth that Gygax originally visualized. As one of the parallel Earths, Oerth appearently had a Mars with little green men when he had his son play. We know that the Oerth map which appeared in "Dragon" didn't fit with his vision either--yet it's all we do have to work with since Gary didn't provide more details...unless we flesh it out ourselves. Everything is optional (except the fun, that's required)! Smile
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    Tue Apr 14, 2009 6:12 pm  

    Yup, sometimes it's difficult to go by EGG's vision alone since even the Darlene map most of us know well wasn't exactly what EGG played with either. When talking about the topic of this thread specifically we are also talking Arneson, Ward and other authors as well. Very collaborative sources which is what I like.
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    Thu Apr 16, 2009 4:52 am  

    Thanks everyone for the extra info. That's interesting how CotGs and the Egg of Coot are unrelated . . . the list of extra-terrestrial visiters from different universes grows!

    I've been doing more research and I've decided Star Frontiers doesn't do it for me. The game is very thread-bare in terms of setting material and just doesn't exite me.

    Gamma World on the other hand I think is very cool. In fact, if you played it right, it could almost be a fantasy setting.

    My plan so far is to have the PCs explore the CotG. Perhaps they are tipped off that servants are Iuz are keen to explore the site also and must contend with them.

    Anyway, my CotG will come from the Gamma World universe. It may not be a Warden-class starship, but it is from the same place. The ship left many years before the apocalyptic events that blasted the Gamma World so the crew on the CotG have no idea what has happened to Earth.

    On the ship, there will be a worm-hole gate back home. It is not functioning however - it cannot cross alternate universes. The PCs need to incorporate magic (perhaps a wish spell) to get it to work across alternate universes. So science and magic are necessary to open the worm-hole.

    When they activate the gate, however, something goes wrong and the entire CotG, the crew and the PCs are transported to Gamma World!

    I haven't decided whether the PCs magic would work on Gamma World, though . . .
    GreySage

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    Thu Apr 16, 2009 7:48 am  

    Speaking of EGG's original vision, Dragon Magazine #17 recounts an expedition by characters from Castle Greyhawk into the Metamorphosis Alpha universe. In that adventure, magic worked, but spellcasters couldn't regain their spells afterward.
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    Sat Apr 18, 2009 6:10 am  

    I guess there's 2 paths I could take regards magic on Gamma World:

    1) Gamma World is a dead magic area. Maybe magic existed a little bit in the past but it has since waned completely. Or, more likely, magic never existed. This means all spells and items won't work on Gamma World. Psionics, however, will work normally.

    2) Magic works on Gamma World. (Perhaps divine magic doesn't work, though, due to the cleric's distance from their deity.) This option could lead to some interesting things like mixing science and magic. Like in the Dragonstar d20 setting for example.
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    Thu Apr 30, 2009 9:18 am  

    rasgon wrote:
    Speaking of EGG's original vision, Dragon Magazine #17 recounts an expedition by characters from Castle Greyhawk into the Metamorphosis Alpha universe. In that adventure, magic worked, but spellcasters couldn't regain their spells afterward.


    It seems to me that if a magic-user was trapped for some time (years?) in the MA universe, they might be able to harness the ability to create new spells in this universe. I mean if spells worked there in the first place...

    They would be spells that were specific to that environment (Metamorphosis Alpha)and were a part of it.
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    Fri May 22, 2009 4:24 am  

    What other alien creatures (as in from space) are there in GH canon?

    Someone already mentioned the olman gods, there's the mysterious Tsololandril, possibly Kelanen (Kelanen is an ancient being of unknown race and origin, having been around since at least the Great Migrations), perhaps even Philidor the Blue?
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    Fri May 22, 2009 11:50 am  

    The AD&D module I11, Needle, is not specifically set in Greyhawk, or IIRC anywhere, but very well could be. Characters are sent from a generic kingdom to a far off jungle to retrieve an obelisk. It is pretty much standard fantasy until the end. Here is a quote from the module’s adventure background:

    “In Part 3, "The Powers That Be," the obelisk is safely erected in the kings palace square. At the first full moon, however, a magical doorway appears in its base. The king orders the characters to enter it to find out what's going on. The PCs enter the obelisk and find themselves in a subterranean world. There they meet a strange race of interplanar traders, intelligent spiders whose base is soon revealed to be on a moon of the characters' world. The Needle is a transportation device! The spiders are eager to trade with the characters, but the PCs must first prove the courage and worth of their races by rescuing the spider-princess from her evil captors and slaying a dragon in the process. If all goes well, the characters return to their city with new weapons, great treasures, and the good will of the spider race.”

    The module is still free to download: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads
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    Fri May 22, 2009 3:28 pm  

    The alien spiders from Needle, the Chak, are the same as the planar spiders described in various OD&D products by the same author, Frank Mentzer.

    There is a crashed neogi spacecraft (a spelljammer) in Treasures of Greyhawk. There is a crashed illithid spacecraft (again, a spelljammer) in From the Ashes. There are references to other spelljammers visiting Oerth from time to time. Creatures prevalent in wildspace include beholders, grell, and elves. Flumphs have been hinted to be lost aliens. A race of wormlike invaders from a distant world called the tsochari are detailed in Lords of Madness. A mysterious race from ancient Hepmonaland, the Torhoon, are described in the adventure "Ex Keraptis Cum Amore" in Dungeon #77; they are possibly originally from another world. The "stellar devas" described here are from some sort of outer space; although classified as celestials, they don't seem to have much to do with the gods or outer planes, and they're definitely connected to the stars.
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    Fri May 22, 2009 9:57 pm  

    The Spellweaver in Age of Worms who taught Kyuss about the worms I believe was other-Oerthly. The long gone civilization that built Exag (There was a late Dungeon article that covered this place) was possibly out of this world as well.
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