Well, my gang still wants to do a mad Victorian Super-pulp campaign, but odd scheduling, lay-offs and the dread specter of COVID-19 'held Dominion over all' so those plans are on hold. Sadly, half the gang now want to use Light City as the basis for this game now-
punverse.blogspot.com/p/light-city.html -and while I have nothing against this Swords & Wizardry Continual Light set of rules (and love the Lego approach the authors took) I want to Run Hoodlums & Hideouts, darn it! So, to keep from being outvoted i'll just have to make a H&H Rosetta Stone so everybody can play what they want. Probably a mash-up of H&H 1st Edition (S&W themed) with bits of 2nd Edition and a little LC conversion so that the Rules mesh(as is, LC characters do 1pt+STR mod in Unarmed Combat and die at 0HP...OOPS!). Anyway, once I get that barrier out of the way, anyone can play what they want-and if some oddball then wants to play a pure H&H 2nd Edition PC or a refugee from some other OGL game, i'll just Flailsnails it and make the Player keep track of their own variant Rules...
Sadly, I have all the time in world for this.
However, this Crisis of RPG Earths did give me a setting idea:
Before Light City...there was Lighthouse Bay. Founded by settlers in 1799 as the town of Gabriel Quay,this sleepy hamlet was unremarkable in every way-except for the massive bonfire lit nightly by the Millar Family on the Rock of Light, a sturdy little island a single league away from the rocky cliffs, treacherous reefs and numerous sandbars. Lacking a true lighthouse, the Rock of Light kept merchants bound for other cities from being wrecked and looted on the rocky shores of the Bay. The Moore and Claremont families banded as one to ban Wreckers and smugglers from preying on trade vessels, even as the Kirbys used their tiny fleet (5 sturdy armed clippers) to deter piracy and render aid to stranded vessels.
This charity did not go unnoticed by the great Merchant Houses of the Yankee states-compacts and treaties were signed, Monies were invested from Boston , Plymouth, Harrisburg, Richmond, Savannah, Columbia...workers were hired to dredge the shallows, and by 1837 bands of men (with bright shuttered lanterns by night and silver mirrors by day) flashed an early form of Morse Code to ships and thereby at last allowed merchant vessels access to the waiting customers of Gabriel Quay. The Kirbys were allowed a 2% tariff on incoming and outgoing goods to maintain a small Naval Militia and to build a Fort on the cliff overlooking the Quay. By the end of 1859 both Fort Mcfarlane (a small granite building lurking behind a hill of packed clay and boasting a modest 30 swiveled 20-pound cannon) and the newly-christened Gabriel's Lantern were ready for operation. The Lantern boasted the brightest lamp that could be installed in 1859-furthermore, it had a secondary lamp, usable in emergencies but also equipped with high-speed shutters to enable night-time warnings in Morse, and a deployable lensed mirror to signal the same by day-truly a miracle of the modern age, and in acknowledgment of this wonder the town renamed itself Lighthouse Bay...
And in 1861, Civil War came to the United States, and Lighthouse Bay's newfound prosperity ended-as did everyone else's.
For all that, the Bay was largely untouched by the War-Husbands and sons went to join the Union Army, and did not always return alive or whole, and a rather lively Confederate spy network was unearthed and dealt with...but Lighthouse Bay was too far north to see Confederate armies, and if a few Blockade runners were spotted off the coast they were largely ignored. Unless they came too close or tried to raid the Bay, in which case the Guns of Fort M would bark-and all the lights would go out, leaving only the dark, hungry teeth of reef and shallow to devour Confederate hulls...times were lean in Lighthouse Bay, but as everywhere else, the citizens made do.
But the war is past now-it is the year 1886 and money flows through Lighthouse Bay once more. The town is now nearly 1/5 the size of Boston (only three days by ship or 5 by carriage) and almost 1 person out of 15 in the Bay got to visit the 1883-1884 World's Fair held there. Lighthouse Bay clippers visit Boston, Kingsport and have been spotted as far as Rhode Island. The Kirby Fleet has only three vessels now-but they are decommissioned Union Ironclads, and Fort M boasts 25-pound repeaters and Maxim Guns even though the Militia is growing lazy and lax during peacetime. It is a wonderful time to be alive in Lighthouse Bay.
But all is not as it seems in the Bay. Dispossessed soldiers from both sides have turned criminal from desperation and bloodlust-smuggling is up, as is banditry, confidence games and burglary. Discovery of Iron, Phosphorous and Pitchblende have spurred mining industry in the nearby Red Hills, but also tent villages full of rowdy miners looking for rough pleasures after weeks of backbreaking labor. Cottage industries are growing into true manufacturing, but the machines maim and kill, and the runoff is driving away the fish and lobster that so many livelihoods depend upon...
Lighthouse Keepers James and Karen Romita know that Lighthouse Bay is in more danger than the town knows-Pastor Jurgen Larsen has faced literal Unnatural evil.Hungry Vampyr were discovered in his very own rectory, feeding under cover of a sudden outbreak of 'consumption'...one was burned to ash yet one escaped. Two of Fort M's men were lost to 'bandit' attacks while on guard duty-but NO human hand slashed those throats, not unless those hands were tipped with blades and stank of seawater. Down in the mines men were lost-and cave-ins are rarely marked by woman-like screams or flashes of purple flame...and why did did that Hungarian fellow Carlo Rossi build what he calls a textile plant, yet hires no willing workers from Lighthouse Bay? And why the countless barrels of pickled Hog carcasses delivered there when the Bay has so many farms? Why all the strange chemicals, the copper rods and wiring and the cut quartz pyramids? And where are the textiles?
The Romitas suspect why-and also suspect why so many young children are becoming 'runaways' never to be seen again-why three 'evening doves' disappeared from the local 'house'...from the Third story balcony. The Romitas understand that sometimes, things learn to walk-that ought to crawl.
But James and Karen Romita have a secret of their own-they and pastor Larsen, and one of the Kirby family, young Dean-and Shawn Claremont and young Emily Millar, who are considering an Elopement to spite both of their recently-estranged Houses...they all assembled together and formed a secret Guild-the Guild of the Lamplighters. This guild gathers and shares every rumor,collates statistics, deduces facts and forms theories,sends discreet messages to Police Commissioner Moore...
And they are recruiting. Persons of either gender and any ethnicity...those who have encountered wickedness and unnaturalness and vowed to oppose it-even some who are unnatural themselves, touched by the bizarre, who dabble with are are possessed of dread powers...if you will swear Covenant under the Lamp of Gabriel, you are welcome here.
Before Light City, there was Lighthouse Bay. And before The Assembly, before The Association...there was The Guild of Gabriel.
Anyway, i'm going to keep developing this place (early Industrial Twin Peaks anyone?
) and maybe, just maybe when Stay at Home and Six Feet Away is a bad memory, we can actually play, face to masked face. Online doesn't do it for us, so we shall wait.
In the meantime (assuming Our Editor doesn't mind and as time allows) I may Post a few bits here so that maybe somebody else can have some fun with them...
) and maybe, just maybe when Stay at Home and Six Feet Away is a bad memory, we can actually play, face to masked face. Online doesn't do it for us, so we shall wait.
Making each Class its own little add-on to the Swords & Wizardry Continual Light Chassis is a great approach for a part-time Hobbyist Creator.