Modern astronomy has put paid to the notion that heaven and hell are anywhere out there, relegating the abodes of the immortals and the dead to another plane of reality that's inaccessible from our universe by natural means, if not entirely imaginary. In older and simpler times it was still conceivable that you might climb a mountain and find the gods, and that on the far bank of a dark and sluggish river lay the dwelling place of those who no longer belonged among the living.
Thus it is in the Vulcanverse, where Hades's realm is a physical location. There are things there that do not sleep. Companions may desert you at the gates. Food in your backpack will rot and flowers wither. Even so one can simply walk into the land of death, a region that Homer tells us is "so dim, so dark, so loathsome; abhorr’d by men and dreadful even to the gods."
But where there is danger there are great prizes to be won, and glory awaits those courageous enough to venture among those "mouldy mansions so ghastly grim that even the gods shudder to think of them." So be sure to have the Hades gazetteer to hand (to be found here and here). And another resource that will be useful to explorers of the Vulcanverse is this list of tickboxes for books 1-4 so you don't have to mar your copies. (Thanks to John Jones for that.)
From a gaming standpoint "Houses of the Dead" suffers a little because it was written before all the Vulcanverse aspects were completely nailed down. This is the book where you learn you need to have some Vinegar of Hades in the Spiderswamp at the moment that you need it in that swamp. If you don't have it, you lose your character and have to start over.
ReplyDeleteThat said, because HotD is the first VV book it has a lot of places to get little bonuses to rolls so it isn't as unforgiving on that part. There's also a lot of ways to get Vinegar of Hades so even if you didn't know you needed it, there's still a decent chance that your character might be carrying some when you hit the swamp. IIRC that was the case when I first played through the book.
I had nailed down quite a few rules before we started writing. The snag was, Jamie didn't read my rules doc! But usually he's much better than me at setting up quests and guiding the player towards areas of interest. I tend to throw them in the deep end and let them sink or swim, which I gather is not popular with today's gamebook readers. I promise to address that (a bit) in book 5, where I'm being careful to set up the items you'll need in the finale.
DeleteI will note that the Code Words section includes the various Contracts for Book 3 so people don't have to keep going back and forth to section 101. I also included the "Palace Vault Key" so it doesn't have to be listed as (a potentially losable) part of one's possessions.
ReplyDeleteThe key should really have been attached to a codeword or title for that reason. Thanks for fixing it, John.
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