Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Lovecraft as bad writer?

When I read Lovecraft as a teenager I was looking for suspense and thrills. I did not find it. Instead I found the strange choice of wide distance from the supposed action. Decades later I started rereading Lovecraft exactly for that distance.

It’s a choice to see everything through a filter of disbelief in reality (now). A state of shock that fades out sound and puts the world seemingly in slow motion. The distance he creates also reminds me of what I imagine clinical depression to be like. Lovecraft’s Cosmic Horror is mostly existential and I can’t stop reading him for the out of body experience he provides.

Cthulhu is a stupid looking monster, but it also turned into an universal icon of the wish that everything would come to an end - jokingly of course, because nonfundamentalists don’t believe in Judgement Days, but sometimes wish for it anyways. Cthulhu turned into that fix in geek culture. Dark Gnosis: look it up.

Monday, November 14, 2016

Savage Worlds Low Life: Random Bodul Tables

Roll for the central piece of the Bodul:

1-5 Torso
6 Head
7 Leg or Foot
8 Hand or Arm or Tentacle
9 Eye
10 "Ball"

Roll how many body parts are connected: 2d4 minus 1 (one to seven)

Roll for each of the parts

1 Torso
2 Head
3 Leg or Foot
4 Hand or Arm or Tentacle
5 Eye
6 Primary or Secondary Sexual Organ

Each of these body parts is connected to 1d4 minus 3 additional body parts (zero to 1)
Exception: if you roll a Torso 1W4 minus minus 2 additonal body parts (zero to 2) are connected