BX Mars Deep City Ruins Zine, Early days.

 Here is a look at the table of contents and rough notes for the upcoming BX Mars Deep City Ruins Zine

BX Mars

Into the Ruins (BXM2)

Brief: An in-depth look at the deep city ruin environment, 2 new classes, three new factions a bunch of maps and art and stuff.

Intro

Classes (Scout, Druid)

Masteries

Factions 

Dry Well

Deep Xumos- three maps. 

Denizens of the Deep ruins

On presenting monsters

New wonders of the ancients

Appendix 1

Appendix 2

Optional rules for smaller groups. 

Design notes and possible conversions. 

6-8 page comic. 

The Deep City Ruins. 

The edges of Ruined Xumos are controlled by the Thark, but the deeper into the ruins one ventures, the wilder and more dangerous things become. 

There’s a water source somewhere below the city and, ancient machines, the final vestiges of a forgotten irrigation system of unthinkable proportion, bring it to the surface. As a result the city is choked with vegetation. Some of it is dangerous. Nearly all of it is edible if properly processed and some of the plant’s will do their best to eat you as well.

This vegetation, of course, provides a basis for the local food chain. Within the confines of Zerzura, the biodiversity of the deep city ruins is matched only by that of Shadow Canyon. Many of the plants and animals living in the city can be found nowhere else in the region or, possibly the entirety of mars. 

There are wonders of the past and many other valuable things to be found in and under the deep city. Every year, dozens of Martians, red and green, alike, set out from the settlement at the frontiers edge and venture into the ruins in hopes of finding such things. Most don’t come back. Few of those who do escape with more than their lives. Countless stories and rumors tell of treasure found and then lost again the prospectors were slain on their way out of the ruins.

One of the great treasures supposedly lost in the ruins is a working food machine. It is almost certain that each of the regions factions sends agents in search of it from time to time. Such a find would surely destroy the current balance of power and spark the Zezura’s first major armed conflict in time out of mind. 

However stories of lesser treasures have been more than enough to motivate a steady stream of prospectors for time out of mind. 

Who ventures into the ruins? Members of every class represented in the BX Mars book and the two new classes presented in the following section are suitable for Deep Ruin adventures. 

Classes

The Scout

Scouts are one of the rare classes available to both Thark and Red Martians. Scouts are individuals who have dedicated their lives to exploring the ruins of the city. Although individuals they are often business rivals, costs generally work in a loose association with one another. As stated above, few expeditions return, even fewer do so without scouts. It should not be assumed that a given scout will know the layout of a particular area. The frontier between the civilized city’s edge and its deeper sections is constantly shifting inward. 

 

The Druid

Rarely encountered outside the ruins, Druids are Thark! who through rigorous effort have attained a level of psionic influence over plants and animals.

New Masteries

Backtrack

Ruin Lore

Jimmy

Factions

The Explorers

A loose association of druids and scouts. 

The Grax: warriors and leaders of the great horde. They rarely act in concert and might defiantly makes right. 

The Nuphal: The traders maintain a permanent presence here and is always interested in the acquisition of ancient artifacts, regardless of means. 

The Unclean: Servants of the Mad Sun lurk here as they do everywhere. They actively attempt to disrupt trade and sew discord between the other groups. More than one scout and possible a druid or two as well are agents of the unclean. They lead prospectors into the ruins and either kill them or abandon them once they are lost. Unclean druids may have special relationships with some of the evil creatures who lair in the ruins. 

Spies: Virtually every power and faction in the region- and perhaps one or two from elsewhere as well, maintain spies in Dry Well. 

Dry well and Beyond

Map of Dry Well

Map of section: Extremely overgrown.

Map of section: Broken terraces, waterfall.

Map of  section: This one overwhelmed by Sand and partially underground as a result.  

Each map comes with a gazetteer. 

Urban Weather Table

Denizens of Deep City

Blood Monkeys

Vine snakes

Club moss

Tangler

Stone Spider

Cleaning cubes

There will certainly be more content then this, as well as too many maps. 

There will be two versions, one with full nudity, another with a lot of convenient shadows and opaque gusts wind. 

BX MARS A map of Zerzura

This is a map of Zerzura the setting presented in my new book BX Mars. The book is available on Drive Thru RPG  in both pdf and pod hardcover. If you’re interested cover image to the right and it will take you to the listing. Note- you may have to change your settings on Drive Thru to let you view  “adult” material.
And now on to the map:

Click or tap on image to enlarge. 

BX mars, final update

Mars went to the copy editor a few days ago layout is 8/10ths done and the cover art is below. The next time we’ll see anything about it here will be when we look at the proof in a month or so.

Bad Canyon, Player’s Map BX Mars

I have at least 15-20 maps from the play test.
Here’s One:

BX Mars Atlas Preview

Google Plus has nearly died months before the announced shutdown. It’s like air going out of tire over there.
Here’s a Mars Preview, safe for work, I am sorry to say.

B/X MARS: Faction Preview: The Changers

THE CHANGERS

 An ab-god,  ressurectionist,  and committed medical experimenter, The Doll Maker controls an army of his own manufacture comprised of undead and freakish warriors produced by his experiments.  Assisted by several lesser mad scientists, the Doll Maker also controls a network of spies, and agents throughout the region and perhaps beyond. 

Places of Power The Black Hand, a twisted tower tree south of Xards. 

The Shape of Things The Doll Maker employs agents of all sorts throughout Zerzura. The largest contingent of his network, however, is engaged in the occupation of procuring corpses. 

Goals The Doll Maker and his organization strive to build a powerful army. the Doll Maker wished to march on Shadow Canyon and eradicate whatever alien presence resides there.  

Demeanor Capricious and unpredictable, the Doll Maker is as likely to help someone as harvest them for parts. He is, however, always on the lookout for able agents, and, especially recent intelligence regarding Shadow Canyon.

NSFW More B/X Mars art

As thing grind to their inevitable conclusion ( I could proably relaease this thing as is right now) art most of it is NSFW, begins to pile up. For those who are more interested in dudes- soon.  

Voyage to Mars in 4 parts (art)

B/X Mars: Saving throw table and Olga of Mars (fomerly of earth)

BX Mars, some arts and maps of Xards and Zerzura

An illustrations and two maops. Yes those peoplae are naked- get used to it. AC on mars is based on class and level, bot armor. Nobody wears shit, for a variet of reasons. 

I have no idea how many illustrations I’ve done for this thing. The other day I found 10 that I’d forgotten about. All the art is by me, beacuse I am both competent (That’s something I would not have written just two years ago) and really cheap. 

Mars Preview The Grax

THE GRAX

Thark! horde, 10,000 strong, as of late, ruled over by Goom a huge and savage warrior of limited intelligence. 

Places of Power: The Grax make their camp at the edges of Ruined Xumos.  

The Shape of Things: The Horde stagnates and goes nowhere. A decade or more ago, the Grax defeated their traditional enemy the Huuurn, a horde to the north. They have been at loose ends ever since. Furthermore, continuous leadership struggles, and the resulting deaths,  have undermined the brain power of the Grax elite. Many warriors of renown have walked away from the horde in disgust. The struggles have mostly died down, now that Goom has taken control, but the damage has been done. 

Pastoralists, foragers, and horticulturists, the Grax Horde takes sustenance from their herds and secret gardens in the deep city, unaware that they have reinvented food production. 

Goals: Best described as the sleeping giant of Zerzura, the Grax Horde is aimless and without purpose or momentum. 

Demeanor: Violent and Savage, the Horde takes what it wants and asks, nor expects, any mercy

Weird canyon MAP

The players map for weird canyon, the curent BX Mars game. 

B/X Mars, Weird Canyon, Session 3, Part One

Mars: Weird Canyon Session 3. 

We rejoin our heroes, mere minutes after the close of our previous episode- still trapped within the lair of doctor Stitch. 

The cast: 

Leopold the Terran- currently missing.

Quas Joktar, thark! of the Grax horde. 

Cyno Drox, Menton.

Xeibrixia Nelvo Menton.

The hours grind past. The poor wretch on the table twitches and moans. Dr. Stitch and the Whip enter the room, stare at the prisoners and talk in giggling whispers between themselves. 

As they depart, Nelvo uses his cloud-mind power to confuse Doctor Stitch. The doctor opens Nelvo’s cell door and departs. 

Nelvo  exits his cell, grabs his gear from the pile in the corner and lets the others out. 

Once everyone is geared up, they concoct a plan. Drox climbs up into the pipe-works and hangs a noose over the threshold. The others lie in wait. 

Dr Stitch enters.

The noose closes around his windpipe- and yanks him upward!

A flurry of stabbing and psionc attacks follow.  

Dr Stitch’s Skull flares and a wave of warp energy explodes outward,  but it is a feeble attempt and does no damage.

Doctor Stitch expires; his corpse begins to seep a stinking and viscous, boiling yellow ichor; gummy and hot it drips, smoking, onto the floor

The party exits the cell block and comes once more (see the session 2 AP) into the huge cavern full of vats. They see some creepy half formed monstrosities and vat-goons floating in the vats. 

The party wanders in a vain attempt to find a way out and stumbles into the the vat-goon kennel. Oriented now, they flee towards Dr Stitch’s office, goons and their master hot on their heels. 

They make their way over the floating bridge; past the giant sslarg; and into the office- which they quickly loot. The acquire a sun beam pistol and ray gun tubes. 

After exiting by the only remaining door, the party runs down a long flight of eroded steps, and finds themselves in a magna rail station, like the one they visited under the rocket tower in session one- except in good repair. 

Before them a train floats at the platform’s edge.

The noise of pursuit comes from behind. 

Someone places a mystery triangle with a green center into an identically shaped depression alongside the train door. The door opens. The party piles in, stumbling over one another. 

Vat-Men and stitchlings swarm the platform.

The door whisks closed and train shoots away from the station.

End part one. 

B/X MARS PREVIEW: THE DREAMERS

Another Atlas entry:

I’m finishing up this product now and getting the last little bit of writing and the final details squared away. I still have about 1k words and a few random tables to write.

On the topic of G+:
I probably will not be joining all of you on any of the new sites or old sites. I am going to move back in here and at my webcomic site.
The blogroll is a work in progress. You have to import everything one by one. i’m still working it. i want to put your blog up.
You may speak:

B/X Mars: The Black Hand

G+ hurtles towards destruction as B/X Mars nears completion.
Anway, I have slowly been moving back over here, anyway. The big hold up was reconciling the different technolgical eras of all the hardware and software invovled.
I’ll be restructuring and turning back on comments over the next few days.
Here’s the thing:

It took me the better part of an hour to figure out how to move a photo from one google ap to another. It’s like 2004 up in here.

BX Mars session two AP

Mars play report

Session one: two mentons and thark find a map, a weird triangle thing; explore a tower and kill an albino ape. 

Not so Brief AP from session two. 

Lured in by the scent of bbq Ape, Leopold from Terra joins the boys. Together they set off over the desert for the Pyramid. 

The pyramid is a day and half walk away. Twice along the way the group is accosted by ant-men. Drox and Quas are able to scare them off with crazy lucky energy weapon shots each time. Many ant-men die, cooked meat and red shell fragments rain from the sky; it’s like a bomb went off in a lobster tank. 

Death comes easy on the Red Planet- or so one would think. 

Upon arriving at the Pyramid they find a huge pool next to the monument. Water pours into the pool from an eroded fountainhead half way up the pyramid’s side. 

They slake their thirsts, fill their water bottles and see a giant tattooed croc in the bottom of the pool. As they begin to discuss killing the croc and breaching the Pyramid, like common vagabonds, the ground begins to shake. The tripod strides over the dunes. And looks down on them from its single eye. It is twenty feet tall. Eventually, although it harms no one,  the tripod drives them away from the pyramid. 

From there the group heads east towards an Airship wreckage. A strange atonal melody lures them off track however and they find themselves standing in front of a battered bell like structure topped by strange metal tines- which coupled with the wind account for the desert music. 

After entering the structure and descending a ruined escalator, they find a small facility of technological design, but ruined beyond use or understanding. 

A huge cybernetic arachnid  attacks from a pit in the floor; a few savage blows from the fellas sends it back into its hole. 

Nelvo discovers a tunnel in the wall of the larger of the place’s room. Stooping, the party enters the tunnel and finds a monorail, with a handcart. Mounting the hand cart, they set off down the track. 

Things are pretty swell really. 

The track and tunnel end. A rough hewn set of stairs leads upward to a door. The door opens on a wide natural cavern with several pits cut into the floor. Huge one-eyed shark-toothed THINGS begin to climb out of the pits. Laughing and midnight hued, a boneless seeming and obscenely thin humanoid with a head of flashing lights and impossibly long fingers snapping like whips, begins to moonwalk towards the characters whispering “Morsels for the Master; morsels for the master” 

Everybody runs, not back the way they came, but through an archway to the left. 

The interior surface of the corridor they enter is pulsating veiny pink flesh, milky misshapen eyes start to open all along the walls. 

Someone says- fuck this place! or something to that effect.

Creepy pursuit noise spurs them on into another room. A cavern again, but this time full of high tech gear.  A mist clings to the floor. Tubes and vats, vaguely humanoid shapes stirring within,  stand in rows, vanishing into the mist towards the back of the room. 

There is no time to linger and they run through a natural arch and into a another flesh hall. A series of twist and turns bring them to heavy door- they pass through into a circular room with a pit in place of a floor. A huge sslorg writhes at the pit’s bottom, reaching hungrily upward with its tentacles.   The controls for a retractable bridge can be seen on the pit’s far side. Leopold grabs Drox and leaps across the pit. The sslorg attacks grabbing Drox’s leg!

On the other side of the pit Nelvo and Quas Joktar look back they way they came only to see a score or more knife and cleaver wielding little humanoids apparently stitched together from spare parts, boil into the passageway crawling on the walls and ceiling like a swarm of roaches and screaming “Morsels for the Master!” Over and over again.

Quas closes the door. 

Leopold rips the tentacle clean off the sllorg. The bridge is extended, just as the outer door starts to cave in as if from some great force. The group opens the door on the far side of the pit and enters the room beyond.

They meet Dr Stitch.

He kills them all, except Nelvo who runs into a wall with a spearpoint against his chest.

Later, they wake up.

Each has been completely healed, and lies behind an energy field, alone in a cell, one of several lining the outside of an oval room.  In that room there is a large slab. Dr Stitch hovers over the slab as the horrible butchered thing upon it shudders and dies. 

The doctor takes a tarry looking black sphere about the size of grapefruit from his lab coat and holds it over the corpse. 

It flows away from his hand and covers the corpse in a thick black sheath. Minutes later, it contracts back into a ball, leaving a living and seeming healthy Red warrior strapped to the slab.

He wakes looks around him.

He  begins to scream.

Dr Stitch laughs long and hard and then leaves the room. 

End session. 

vat goon 

Mars Monster Gallery and drivel.

I'm not dead,  I just went dark a couple of months ago in order to focus all my efforts in one direction. BX Mars. I will attempt to keep you updated a little better as I draw closer to completion. Character Generation is just about done, and will be complete aside from art, later today if I don't slack off.  The Atlas is mostly done,  lots and lots of maps are already done, Monsters, aside from a Handful of illos are DONE.
basically I am yrying to clear the deck of old projects.  so if there is something you've liked and wanted to see more of. I'm going to get to them all- one at a time.

okay,  bitches,  here's the art:

[nsfw] Planet Four Friday, returns!

And there it is:

 

The blogging will recommence on Monday.