Hereticwerks recently looked at the Maelstrom in gaming, with ideas for treating it as a monster or hazard to navigation, a basis for a terrain piece.
They also suggested it could be a gateway, maybe to a strange sea, or even a Weak Point between the worlds, possibly one of the more final Ends.
I'll
definitely add this take on it to the Ends list, but it would
be good to explore the idea and get some options, maybe a table to roll on for each descent.
That could be used in roleplaying for an encounter, or in weird wargaming for a campaign event, maybe as a way to move a long-term game to a new setting or transform it. In fiction overall it could be a good source of inspiration.
As an example destination, the original post gives the fluidic space of Voyager's species 8472, and I suggest it could be somewhere a flood washes up, like the Deadly Desert in Return to Oz, or that a traveller could become a water baby, as in the novel or 1978 film.
Like the portals list and the Ends itself, it's a good subject to crowdsource. If you have a suggestion, leave a comment. I'll expand the table and credit you with a link.
The descent into the Maelstrom... (1d8)
- ... carries the traveller into fluidic space. (Hereticwerks)
- ... washes the traveller up in the Deadly Desert.
- ... transforms the traveller into a water baby.
- ... becomes a water chute pouring into a cavern holding a galleon, an Inferno.
- ... with a hideous pause on the very threshold of bearability gives way to a cataract of surging, turgid unseen green waters cascading with a mighty roar into the heart of a fog-bound estuary just on the very verge of visibility. Some place long abandoned. Deserted. But very much alive. (garrisonjames)
- ... wakes the traveller - who is afloat and wired up in a sensory deprivation tank.
- ... fades to calm as the traveller emerges from a long-overgrown spawning pool.
- ... builds to a convulsion, ejecting the traveller either into or from a bodily cavity.
There's more inspiration in the original post, and the first for the Ends could also help.
Update: Entries 4+ are being added now, as per this post.
Update: All done - it's now one of the Ends.
_
Update: Entries 4+ are being added now, as per this post.
Update: All done - it's now one of the Ends.
4 comments:
Thanks for the mention. We're finishing-up a few supplemental bits concerning Maelstroms, so this is a welcome development indeed. Nice to see Oz getting brought into the discussion. We're big fans of Mr. Baum's fantastical realm.
Me too. Plenty of traffic, but no one seems ready to dive in just yet. I'll give it a bit more time then add some myself.
...with a hideous pause on the very threshold of bearability the Maelstrom gives way to a cataract of surging, turgid unseen green waters cascading with a mighty roar into the heart of a fog-bound estuary just on the very verge of visibility. Some place long abandoned. Deserted. But very much alive.
That was quick. Do we know it? More to the point, do we want to?
It's going to eight anyway, if not higher. I've made only a small edit to have it fit the lead-in passage, just removing the words "the Maelstrom".
For anyone just tuning in, this is getting finished at last. Details here.
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