Amazonian Regiments of Ever Glorious Renown

Presenting a Tékumel / Warhammer crossover- mashup, wherein in I refactor some of the forces of the Empire of the Petal Throne into Warhammer-speak. Many of the Tékumel character designs seem to fit a Lustrian setting not least because of the influence of mesomerican design.

The Aridáni Legion of Lady Mríssa

The Lady Mrissa is a young Noblewoman from the City of Geniana, The Aridáni Legion form her personal honour guard as well as fulfilling various stately duties throughout the city. Called to arms by Lady Mrissa for special missions, famed for their heroic and profitable raids on the corrupt Sea Elf temple of Wohn-gar, and as a welcoming committee for the Norse raiding party led by Sonny Ericssonson.

The armour of the Aridáni Legion of Lady Mríssa is made of especially cured and treated Cold One skin, decorated with gold.

Aridáni Karéng of Lady Merissa | John Winter | Tekumel Project

Name	M	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Int	Cl	Wp	Weapon 1	Weapon 2	Armour	PV
Lady Mrissa (Kérdu)	4	6	6	4	4	3	6	3	9	9	9	9	Sword	None	Chestplate & Shield	52.5
Karéng	4	5	5	4	4	2	5	3	8	8	8	8	Sword	None	Chestplate & Shield	36.5
Semétl	4	4	4	4	3	1	4	1	7	7	7	7	Sword	None	Chestplate & Shield	10.5
Káing (standard)	4	3	3	3	3	1	4	1	8	7	7	7	Sword	None	Chestplate & Shield	7
Musician	4	3	3	3	3	1	3	1	7	7	7	7	Sword	None	Chestplate & Shield	6.5
Troop	4	4	3	4	3	1	4	1	7	7	7	7	Pike	Sword	Chestplate & Shield	9.25

Kérdu - Lady Merissa | John Winter | Tekumel Project

Legion Trooper  | John Winter | Tekumel Project

The Legion of the Sapphire Kirtle 

 

Priestess Dijáya |
Kérdu of the Sapphire Kirtle | John Winter | Tekumel Project

Lady Dijáya head Priestess of the Sacred Mysteries of Dilinála. The Legion of the Sapphire Kirtle a loose knit group of skirmishers. Keep predatory birds, jaguars, Slann, Lizardmen, Pygmies, Norse raiders, patriachal capitalists, and other nuisances away from the sacred forest shrines where the secret rituals of Amazonian progenation take place.

Name	M	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Int	Cl	Wp	Weapon 1	Weapon 2	Armour	PV
Lady Dijáya (Kérdu)	4	6	6	4	4	3	6	3	9	9	9	9	Axe	None	None	51
Karéng	4	5	5	4	4	2	5	3	8	8	8	8	Axe	None	None	35
Semétl	4	4	4	4	3	1	4	1	7	7	7	7	Axe	None	None	9
Káing (standard)	4	3	3	3	3	1	4	1	8	7	7	7	Axe	None	None	5.5
Musician	4	3	3	3	3	1	3	1	7	7	7	7	Axe	None	None	5
Javelin	4	3	4	3	3	1	3	1	7	7	7	7	Javelin	Axe	None	5.75
Slinger	4	3	4	3	3	1	3	1	7	7	7	7	Sling	Axe	None	5.75

Legion of the Sapphire Kirtle | John Winter | Tekumel Project

The legion of the Sapphire Kirtle are fielded as Skirmishers, and hate men.


Note the Legion of the Saphire Kirtle is on pre-order sale

Princess Vrísa Vishétru

HA-1 Princess Vrísa Vishétru of Saá Allaqi | John Winter | Tekumel Project

Name	M	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Int	Cl	Wp	Weapon 1	Weapon 2	Armour	PV
Princess Vrísa Vishétru	4	6	6	4	4	3	6	3	9	9	9	9	2 Handed Sword	None	Full Plate	53.5

Princess from far Saá Allaqi - to the North of the Amazonian heartlands. A foreigner, with unusual ways, it is rumoured that she has taken a male Sea Elf as a lover, tolerated by the majority of Amazonian high society as something of a novelty.  Typically the Sisterhood suspects her of harbouring treacherous intentions against the ruling Koka-Kalim cult, and her as potentially blasphemous in some undefinable way.

The large flame-like sword is symbolic of her devotion to the god of fire and war Vimúlha - rumoured to be a more ancient aspect of the chaos entity Khörne, worshipped by the Legion of the Red Devestation.

Ru'ún:  Bronze Demoness

Queen Mechanika | John Winter | Hydra Miniatures

The Ru'ún were constructed by arcane methods in the ancient days of Slann and Amazon partnership to guard Warp Gates between Terraforming Ziggurat stations. When the Warp-gate system collapsed, these technological idols were left mute, standing guard over the ancient cyclopean ruins dotted all over the Known World. Whilst remaining dormant for millennia they may be awoken at any time by the presence foolhardy or greedy explorers seeking riches in these forbidden places. The Ru'ún are powered by pure warpstone hearts.

Name	M	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Int	Cl	Wp	Weapon 1	Weapon 2	Armour	PV
Ru'ún: Bronze Demonesses	4	8	8	5	4	3	9	4	12	12	12	12	Hand Blaster	Powersceptre	Bronze	72

During close combat the Ru'ún  makes 2 attacks with its Sceptre, and 2 energy blasts from it's warpstone powered hand-blaster.  Attacks from both weapons cause Instability.

Item	Strength	Initiative	Damage	Save Mod.	Short	Max	To Hit Short	To Hit Long	Area
Hand Blaster	4	0	1	-1	8	16	+2	0	0

Item	Strength	Initiative	Damage	Save Mod.
Powersceptre	5	0	1	-1

While it will obey the posessor of an Incomparable Eye of Command or an Amulet of Ruling the Ru'ún will otherwise ignore all attempts to negotiate, and having not received other instructions proceed , note that the Ru'ún is completely immune to Change Allegiance or other "charm" type spells and all Illusions.

Some Notes on The Aridáni of the Empire of the Petal Throne

Tsolyanu aka "The Empire of the Petal Throne" is one of 5 human empires on the planet Tekumel. It is a deeply "Lawful" society, hugely conservative and deeply structured, it loves ritual, regulation and stability above all else. Most marriages are arranged, and the role of women is largely domestic, or priestly, wheras a mens role can be mercantile, military, or academic - but this is usually bound by Clan obligations. Personal freedom and social mobility are seemingly alien concepts, the Empire of the Petal Throne is a slave-owning culture and whilst the middle-classes may move up or down the ranks of their Clan, the Military or their Temple, due to social schmoosing and valour, nothing opens doors like noble birth.

Any Tsolyani middle-class woman may go before a magistrate and declare herself Aridáni - which is a social status which puts her on completely equal standing with men. In choosing to become Aridáni there is absolutely no loss of face, virtue or womanhood, it is a choice every middle-class Tsolayni female as and is up to the individual and their choice is widely accepted. Clan Elders might be a bit disappointed that some strategic marriage might not have transpired, but ah well...

Aridáni | Jeff Dee

Homosexuality and bisexuality are not uncommon, several of the Empresses and Emprors have been non-hetrosexual,  and is an entirely acceptable and normal part of human sexual nature, there is nothing transgressive about it at all. As long as it exists in a well defined category, then the Tsolyani are happy with it. Subsequently transgender, androgyny and hermaphroditism would seem to confuse and be frowned upon by the Tsolyani,  not that the text goes into much detail - but there are certain alien races on Tekumel which have more or less than 2 genders, which seems to be met with revusion by the Tsolyani. The Tsolyani are not a scientifically curious people, science would be progress, which would be change, which is undesirable. If they managed (or bothered) to codify the various sexual preferences of the non-human races, there's little doubt these things would just be accepted as facts of life.

Sapphire Kirtle

It's this love of categorisation and societal structure that creates social institutions such as the all-lesbian Legion of the Sapphire Kirtle. Similarly there are legions of homosexuals (of both genders) and similarly legions of devotes of the same deities of any gender. Notably one of the main enemies of the Petal Throne - the Yan Koryani is entirely Matriarchal and sees homosexuality as counter-productive to society.

Dejah Thoris & Calot (?) | Frank Frazetta
 Witch Elf on Cold One
Adriani on small Chlén beast

Nudity is common in private and among friends. Tekumel is a hot planet, and human are not native to it nor used to the heat. Clothing tends to be highly codified - items having more symbolic meaning than function. Many of the the EPT illustration I've seen do not shy away from portraying the 'shunned-bodies' of the old and portly, the exotic setting isn't purely an excuse to show Dejah Thoris style nubiles, although no doubt there is some of that to it too - there are certainly subject positions within Tekumel which conform to standards set by a patriarchal hegemony, but many many which don't and are treated as normal by the Tsolyani. Any proponents of Queer Theory (which should really grow up and call itself post-structuralist identity formation theory) looking at gaming artefacts out there should take a look.

---

Works cited:

Empire of the Petal Throne:

Deeds of the Ever Glorious  M. A. R. Barker
Empire of the Petal Throne   M. A. R. Barker
2nd Citadel Compendium  Richard Halliwell
Warhamer Fantasy Battle 2nd Edition.

Any mistakes in Tekumel scholarship are purely my own, and apologies in advance for any idiosyncratic reading of the material.

Chainsaw Warrior

We are the things that were and shall be again! 

Chainsaw Warrior has been reanimated into the digital age by Auroch Digital . The digital version practically simulates playing the board-game. It doesn't deviate from the original mechanics nor are the goals changed from the original to adapt the game for contemporary expectations. Physicality aside, in many ways talking about the one is exactly the same as talking about the other.

Chainsaw Warrior (1987) designer, Stephen Hand interviewed by Auroch Digitals Tomas Rawlings on BGG (here) mentions Sorcerer's Cave (Peter Donelly , 1978) as an inspiration, which is interesting because Sorcerer's Cave itself is a much overlooked gem in the fantasy gaming genre an early attempt at a D&D-lite dungeon-crawl board game. The contrasts between Sorcerer's Cave and Chainsaw Warrior are many, and all probably quite illuminating.

Sorcerer's Cave | Peter Donelly| 1978 | wikipedia

In Sorcerer's Cave one lays out a spatial map, of a cave, no less, and the player explores this space (turning over cards at each location to discover what is there) aiming to go down into the depths and out again, with whatever treasure you can collect before you get hit over then head by an Ogre too many times. Ultimately in Sorcerer's Cave the event deck of cards - which controls what happens within the cave structure is only ever stacked one way. The spatial mapping and player choices of where to move within that space is largely an illusionary conceit, albeit one that helps evoke the exploration narrative. Conversely we can consider something like Chess, the spatial decisions of where to place a playing piece are critical in determining the narrative and the win/lose status. The critical axis in Sorcerers' Cave being neither longditude or latitude or but vertical - the deeper the higher risks and rewards.

Chainsaw Warrior grinds up and discards the spatial metaphor like a useless appendage - instead the event cards become the space the Chainsaw Warrior passes through - the game collapses the 3 dimensional illusion of the Sorcerer's Cave magico-natural labyrinth into a singular, linear plotting of derelict architecture as time. Unlike Sorcerer's Cave or other dungeon-crawl boardgames DungeonQuest or Talisman, or structuralist fantasy myth The Hero With a Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell, 1949) for Chainsaw Warrior there is no returning from the underworld with a great treasure from a dragons horde, no Crown of Command to rule the world, no boon or insight retrieved from the subconscious mind, no alchemists gold emerges from the darkness of the nigredo.  The Chainsaw Warriors aim is only to remove the Darkness or be killed in the attempt, it is a long, grim, dark, march to death, it's not a question of winning, it's a question of surviving long enough to get the job done.*

Boardgame Advert

The emphasis on time, and specifically a unidimensional space-time. leads one to re-consider the narrative from being "You have 60 minutes to save New York" and subsequently failing or suceeding to being "You are a cyborg warrior stuck in a pre-apocalyptic time loop" running repeated, iterative attempts.  The Chainsaw Warrior is essentially a splatterpunk Groundhog Day (Harold Ramis, 1993) - reliving the last, final, ultimate, cataclysmic hour of New Yorks existence over, and over again  Each time you play, trying a new combination of equipment in order to break the time loop paradox caused by the Darkness's dimensional warping and the destruction of spatial reality. Forever crushed upon the grinding wheels of Karma, within each reincarnation the Chainsaw Warrior must circle through the kaleidoscopic abandoned multi-story office block of Hell. Each time, The Chainsaw Warrior dies and again is reborn, gets kitted up and gets sent out to fight. Each time the Chainsaw Warrior learns a little more of what must be done, what equipment makes him better, harder, faster, stronger, what he needs to destroy his foes, and each time he is unleashed against an unending relentless nightmare of death and gore and passageways and mutants and radiation and shotgun shells and broken lift-shafts and filth and rats and undead and chainsaws...

..."groovy".

It's this one-way-ticket-to-Hell concept that the Chainsaw Warrior exploits to finally hack off and nail to the floor on any notion of 'player agency' - gamecrit speak for the ability for the player to make meaningful decisions which effect the outcome of the game. Chess perhaps, has  99% agency - Roulette 1%, and Chainsaw Warrior maybe like Russian Roulette but with a shotgun-chainsaw bayonette.

The Chainsaw Warrior has almost zero strategic  decisions to make during the game - instead we watch a grim, pessimistic splatter comic book, each ard a frame from a graphic novel, which unfolds with variation with every replaying. Indeed,  the digital version of  the game starts off with a nice digital motion-comic (one of the few sanctions to modernisation) wheras the original board game was packaged with a dead-tree comic book...

Chainsaw Warrior | Brett Ewins | 1987

It's worth noting that the board game books and box art is 90% the work of Brett Ewins, whose work on 2000AD - Bad Company, along with stints on Rogue Trooper and Judge Dredd, is classic high thrill-power stuff. He should also be well known to oldschool games fans for his work on 80s Games Workshop products, Chainsaw Warrior (obviously) Blood Bowl and Kaleb Daark. However, his unique aesthetic is missing from Aurochs digital conversion, and they take it in a new direction, gone are Bretts bold, graphic lines and saturated colour, and in comes digital airbrushings in murky colours, not a million miles away from the kind of thing 2000AD or Games Workshop might do today.

Chainsaw Warrior | Auroch Digital | 2014

Another big change in the dynamics between analogue and digital is that the board-game gives the player something to do, albeit mostly bookkeeping and dice rolling, whereas the digital version elevates the player away from the mechanics and instead tapping a touchscreen like interface (I'm playing on Steam on a Windows VM on a Mac - a tablet or iPad or what-have-you might feel different) perhaps choosing which tool to use here, or what weapon to use there,  but mostly tapping cards, and watching the 3d dice roll without really affecting the outcome. Cheating, or "house-ruling on the fly" is made impossible by the digital medium, the Chainsaw Warrior cannot change or control his narrative, only react and interpret it, which is in itself strongly thematic. Enslaved to his fate the Chainsaw Warrior can only look on with grim determination...

Escape from New York | John Carpenter | 1981

In many ways Chainsaw Warrior doesn't have many of the features we commonly recognise as a game at all, it's more like a very focused random narrative generator. Like a pack of 16th Century Tarot cards - which were originally designed as a game but evolved into a divinatory story-telling medium - or William Burroughs Cut Up Method from the 1960s, and no doubt some early 1990s hypertext narratives and Interactive Fiction experiments , Chainsaw Warrior conjures a story out of a closed set of random factors.   The Tarot as narrative generator explored in great effect in Castle of Crossed Destinies (Italo Calvino, 1973), and the weaving of tales of unreliable narrators,  through the mutability of the symbolism of the cards is key to it's success, taking in medieval literature and mythological sources. The Chainsaw Warrrior s pictorial vocabulary is decidedly more specific and direct, less occult and more visceral. Each card tun dragging the reader step by step through a grisly comic book adaptation of a John Carpenter / Sam Raimi 80's video nasty.

Evil Dead (Sam Raimi)

The Chainsaw itself is Splatter genres signifier par excellance , from Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Hooper, 1974) to Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers (Olen Ray, 1988), through Evil Dead II (Raimi, 1987) is possibly the first where a doomed (and time-locked) hero goes to town on a bunch of good for nothing Deadites with a power tool.

Chaos Agents - the demented assassin-scumbags with their hoods and masks, quite clearly Red Redemptionists (a cult dedicated to the god of war found within the Warhammer mythos, and taken wholesale from Druillet Lone Sloane comics - the centrality of visual storytelling underlined once more) Perhaps in questionable taste, it is tempting to read them as a kind of Jihadi Terrorist Incursion, after all this is NY, this is a skyscraper, this is a kind of apocalypse...

Khornate Kaos Kultists

Khornate Kaos Kultists :
We are The Red Redemption
WE ARE EVERYWHERE

... or perhaps mid 2010s cyber-terrorists and hacktivists. The modernity and relevance of the Chainsaw Warrior's symbolism becomes applicable to a whole new set of circumstances and cultural narratives.


Mutant Thing - some sad, almost pitiable, perhaps once human conglomeration of flesh.

John Carpenter | The Thing | 1982

I dunno what the hell's in there, but it's weird and pissed off, whatever it is

With his twisted lump of undifferentiated flesh, the many mouths and eyes, loss of humanity - a pathetic and dangerous radioactive monstrosity.



Wandering Zombies

George A Romero | Zombie 'Bub' | Day of the Dead |1985

Romeros Zombies are by and large allegorical figures, and Zombies remain as contemporary a symbol of society as any other, given the flashmobs, tv-series, endless sequels and plethora of games. The nature of the  Wandering Zombies is peculiar, while we might see in the Chaos Agents the cultic harbingers of doom, the outsider instigators of the apocalypse  - the Wandering Zombies all appear to be military figures, rather than say civilians or hobos or cheerleaders trapped in a municipal building. Perhaps they are revenants of a failed attempt to stop the Chaos Agents, or perhaps time-locked reanimated cadavers of the Chainsaw Warriors own previous attempts at conquering the Darkness, much like the ghosts in Nethack - and The Meat Machine (below), the Wandering Zombies seem to provide a dark mirror of the protagonist - a Karmic demon that must be overcome. As such their wandering nature, as opposed to the Chainsaw Warriors single-minded purposefulness the unwanted attribute which must be overcome.


The Meat Machine

James Cameron | The Terminator | 1984

"Full OCP binary cyborg technology : state of the art destructive capabilities : commanded by a unique combination of software and organic systems"

Might be worth noting that the Meat Machine is something of a design precursor to the Khornemower. That the inter dimensional rift is throwing out evil monsters that apparently mirror the cybernetic and single-minded nature of the Chainsaw Warrior himself - taken to a dehumanised, monstrous extreme raise questions. It reinforces the idea promoted by the militaristic Wandering Zombies that the enemies are aspects, be they Karmic or distorted time-locked reveneants of the Chainsaw Warrior himself, surfacing the repressed shadow-self and hacking their organic face off to show the true face of gleaming red eyed mechanised skulltronica beneath.

While the cyber-gore theme is quite evident, there's nothing truly horrific in the boardgame - the Zombies drawings are all slightly and wonderfully icky, but certainly nothing like an actual splatter movie or the red pixel-sprite drenched gore of Doom. The digital version gets a splatter of blood on the screen during hand to hand combat, but it's a 15 rating perhaps rather than an 18 - that said I think gorehounds and horror freaks would get a lot out of its grimy atmosphere and remixing of familiar themes.

here comes the mirror man.

Chainsaw Warrior isn't an easy thing to get into, for a start 'procedurally generated horror comic books' are hardly mainstream media, and someone arriving at  Chainsaw Warrior with a deeply gamist or strategic mindset is likely to be let down by the experience.  Like the burgeoning and controversial 'video nasty' splatter movie genre, and the experimental literature that it parallels - Chainsaw Warrior requires the right frame of mind to approach. Sometimes you want a mentally challenging puzzle or a feeling of achievement or a laugh with your mates around a table with a few beers. Chainsaw Warrior isn't any of that. It is an awkward thing, it's not a Skyrim or Avatar that seduces with it's glossy sugar-coated visuals, it requires the player gives it attention, and engage their imagination in making the experience work play.


http://chainsawwarrior.net/  for android, PC, iPhone and whathave you for about £3 / $5 which is reasonable, certainly cheaper than picking a copy up 2nd hand on ebay and opens up much the same interdimensional doorway...




* This is very much like The Lord of the Rings, and there are several parallels, the 9 Ringrwaiths and the 9 Agents of Chaos, the hopeless task of lazering Darkness, the hopeless task ofdestroying The Ring, the Radiation damage track could the corrupting influence of The Ring, hugely powerful enemies like the Meat Machine could be the Balrog, zombies as Orcs, elven rope as rope launcher. Add some card art by John Howe, and the road goes ever on, and on...

[RFM] Lone Wolf: Eclipse of the Kai [4/4]

Part 4: The Eclipse of the Kai

Zarganna mounted on a great Imperial Zlan beast, cicling high above the fray,  Arrows whizz past,  sword-clashes, distant shouting, the steady drums of war beating down. Actually the assault on the Kai Monastery works brilliantly, and is absolutely the best bit of the whole tape, a joy to listen to in all its gory detail.

It also helps if, whilst listening, you stare at this magnificent photo:

The Darklords Assault the Kai Monestary (from the Magnamund Companion and White Dwarf)

Along with the Maganmund Companion, this photo also appeared in White Dwarf 62 where no mention of the Kai Monastery is made, it does identify the fire-ball casting chap as the Chronicle Shaman (N12 Hobgoblin Shaman?). However it is noted as "playtesting Warhammer 2nd Edition" which seems a bit odd ...an actual playtest wargame would have bases, no? I suspect marketing shenanigans. Intriguingly the WD states that both this image and John Blanches WFB2 cover are available from Citadel as a poster - quick, to the Tardis Lucy!

The audio version of the battle places much more emphasis on the circling flying troops -  Zlann beasts, and no mention of the wolves evident in the diorama. Magnamundian mythology shifts over time, the tale grows in it's telling...

Alyss returns once again surrounded by warm synth strings with her seemingly infinite powers "but cannot interfere from history" (fixed points in time the plot and all that guff that comes with superpowered mary sue types... 'spoilers') and engages Vonotar in psionic combat. It's another example of how close to AD&D the Lone Wolf world really is.  Evoking synethesia, and the emotional draining of psionic blast. The scene starts off well, but veers off into realms of psychedelic mechanical insects, envoking Ian-Miller esque cyberinsectoid warfare, which dosn't really make all that much sense, and it drags on and on, only to smugly reveal that Alyss was simply delaying Vonotar's arrival at the battle to stop him from killing Silent Wolf.

psionic combat - it all gets a bit trippy | Ian Miller

As he nears the ill-fated Monastery with his message of doom Banedon realises he is to late, and hides amid in ancient ruin of temple stones in a forest and it dawns on me we've caught up with events in the gamebook... 

Banedon - Gary Chalk

 
Silent Wolf wakes up from a half-dream somehow hacked into by Alyss, and returns from slacking off from kitchen duties to view the bloody carnage and gruesome devastation of the Kai Monastery, before turning round and running off into the forest. Catching up with Banedon, and as the cassette spool runs out, finally takes for himself the name Lone Wolf...

Lone Wolf / ZXS Spectrum vsn / Gary Chalk

And there endeth he audiobook advenutres of Lone Wolf. Overall a highly enjoyable listen, some nice faux-medieval digital soundtracking by Joe Dever, some great delivery by Edward DeSouza, nice production values, but unfortunately some of the narrative that didn't work for me (anything regarding Alyss - too high-powered, too cliched).  Shame they didn't continue with the series really. I'm guessing it didn't sell too well, a cassette only release in the days of CD means the platform wasn't cool, and the at the very tail end of the gamebook boom (which itself was fueled by the D&D boom) probably meant it wasn't at quite the right time. A re-release these days on MP3 through digital channels, with the resurgence of digital gamebooks and the continuing expansion of the Lone Wolf brand through books, games (both tabletop and digital) etc. might prove popular. Until then, it can be dug up from Amazon or just don't forget to check the audio section of your local charity shop when hunting green spined books and the little lead men...