Where, oh where has the Grymlorde been

Where, oh where has the Grymlorde™ been?

Short Answer: forum.bioware.com/forum/43-neverwinter-nights and grymlorde.deviantart.com

Long Answer

Yes, I know. Like so many bloggers, I began this blog with some measure of enthusiasm but then soon got distracted. So this is my attempt to bring you, the reader up to speed.

Grym Gygaxian Neverwinter Nights

Neverwinter Nights (NWN) is a videogame based on Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition which came out in 2002. The best parts af the game are 1) is the toolset which is relatively easy to learn and 2) the community (see short answer) of modders which continue to provide new content (modules, monsters, tilesets, spells, &c.). It’s amazing that almost 14 years on, there is still a community. For those who care about such things, the videogame industry still considers the Aurora Toolset in NWN to be the gold standard for user-made content.

Since 2007 I have been actively creating Grym content mostly for my personal use. I have posted some public content at neverwintervault.org but for the most part it has been for my personal use as well as for my son (The Grymson).

My current project is called Castello Xagyg. It is a dungeon adventure inspired by White Box OD&D circa 1974 with a number of customizations pulled from the various supplements and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. Gygaxian dungeon?!? In Grymwurld?!? Heresy I say!

Reconciling OD&D with Grymwurld

As I mentioned in another blog posting, in 1977 I started playing D&D using the original 1974 rules. In the original rules, dungeons were not just dark places, they were unnaturally dark. In the Underworld, the ability to see in low-light or in the dark did not work for the PCs. Even if we managed to charm a monster, their dark-vision would cease to work. We had no choice but to use torches and lanterns which could be blown out by drafts and would eventually burn out. Achieving third level of experience was huge because now the magic-user could learn continual light and make permanent light sources (Clerics had to be sixth level).

This limitation on light sources and the ease by which monsters would see us as well as hide from us gave the games a real edge — almost a feeling of dread and horror. So I decided three years ago to create a dungeon adventure inspired by OD&D but still fit in Grymwurld. One that emphasizes horror and terror and avoids the “funhouse” style of dungeons that became so prevalent. And of course the dungeon is not the only fun part. Just as Grymwurld has always been a dark mirror of Earth, Castello Xagyg is placed on the Isle of Calafia which is what folks used to think of as California. In other words, there is a Dungeon Rush going on similar to the San Francisco Gold Rush. San Castico is the dark version of San Francisco and so on.

So there you have it. A Grym Gygaxian dungeon adventure that mixes Old School Dungeon Crawl with a dark pseudo-historical context and as much role-playing as I can squeeze in (retainers have personalities much like Baldur’s Gate II). When will it be done? Probably never. But perhaps I will publish bits and pieces of it over time. Or maybe The Grymson will inspire me to put some discipline into it. Only time will tell…!