Compromise and Conceit

Infernal adventuring…

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An Australian statistician and role-player living in Japan, interested in the theory and practice of role-playing…

Category: Fantasy

  • Archipelago 50: Alpon

    The Wrathbreakers have explored a deserted deepfolk Observatory, and learnt disturbing things about the time when humans first emerged in the Archipelago from the diary of a deepfolk astronomer who died on the island. Now they must continue in their mission, first to Alpon and then to kill a spider god. They explored the remainder…

  • Archipelago Campaign: Velor’s Journal

    Day 11, 7128 Weather: FineMood: Consternation Today we made some progress replacing the beans that were uprooted by our night visitor, which Eldun maintains is a racoon of some kind. We harvested what beans the visitor had left untouched and the servants suggested using the fishing nets to set a barrier around the plants, but…

  • Archipelago 49: Dust and Memories

    The Wrathbreakers have completed their work in the Outriders, killing the gangster Krotos and all his allies and recovering the Eye of the Dead God. Now that their business here was done, it was time for them to return to their investigations. First, they wanted to find the Observatory alluded to in The Gull’s notes,…

  • Why Is Durin a Man?

    There has been a lot of racist backlash against the decision to cast some non-white characters in the new Lord of the Rings tv series. Tolkien fanboys and fascists (a not very distorted circle on a Venn diagram, it would appear) are very angry that a few new characters – some Harfoots, Durin’s wife, a…

  • Archipelago 48: The Outsiders

    The Wrathbreakers have visited the Lambent Cays and met the Gull, from whom they received some further clues about the secret activities of the Deep Cult. They had considered traveling from Pearl Reach to Jasper at the Southernmost tip of the Lambent Cays, but something happened to change their plans. Itzel had placed a folded…

  • Initial Reactions to the Rings of Power

    Having spent a lot of time writing about Tolkien and racism on here, and having watched fanboys consistently misread Tolkien’s novels in various ways to justify their racist and anti-semitic imagery, I was looking forward to the inevitable backlash at the new Amazon Prime show, the Rings of Power. Being a big Tolkien fan, I…

  • Rereading the Mists of Avalon: MZB’s contempt for women

    Update [2023/12/6]: This is number 2 in a series of posts, and the original post in this series is getting a lot of attention, so I thought I’d link the entire series of posts together for those reading, so that they can follow the entire journey down memory lane. Here are the other posts: A…

  • Archipelago 47: The Lambent Cays

    The Wrathbreakers have encountered parasites on the open seas on the western edge of the Archipelago, and also some monsters. Having killed the monsters, they decided to also kill the bandits who they are working with, but first they must travel to the Lambent Cays to meet the Gull, and find out what this mysterious…

  • Archipelago 46: Of Monsters and Men

    The Wrathbreakers are traveling the Outriders looking for the retired dwarven adventurer known as the Gull. They visited a seastead called the Bones, where they learnt that she is living in a remote island chain called the Lambent Cays, but were told that it is not possible for non-dwarves to visit those islands, so they…

  • Archipelago 45: Among the Outriders

    The Wrathbreakers have secured the Eye of a Dead God, and now they have a list of artifacts that the deepcult is searching for. Though they do not know why the deepcult seeks these strange and disturbing items, they at least now know what they are seeking. They decided to take the Eye of the…