Since I have started a "Land's End Season 2" campaign, I thought it would be a fun post to collect some of my favourite inspirations for the campaigns here.

Some of these informed the tone or atmosphere more generally, and others I stole from directly. See if you can guess which is which!

Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique cycle. Desolate wastes, corrupt wizards, a terrified populace, and Mordiggian!

You already knew it.

Dark Souls, the best console game ever.

Robert E. Howard's El Borak stories. Adventuring amongst savage tribes in the desolate regions of the world, discovering lost cities and vast hidden treasures.

Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborea cycle.

The old Dark Horse Indiana Jones comics, especially Fate of Atlantis. I was going to mention Raiders, but I already wrote a whole blog post about it a few years ago.

H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines. The original 'hidden valley' adventure site!

Myth: The Fallen Lords, by Bungie. Dark fantasy wargame that rips off the Black Company extensively.

Daggerfall, the best Elder Scrolls game. Crude, buggy, dark, mysterious, with a charm all its own.

Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness

Melan's Fomalhaut campaign and materials, like Isles on an Emerald Sea.

Geoffrey McKinney's Carcosa. I wouldn't run it on its own, but picking bits & pieces from it works really well.

Oni Press' Wasteland comics. Post-apocalyptic desert adventures.

The Secret Teachings of All Ages, by Manly P. Hall. Dense and difficult, sometimes woefully outdated, but worth a read.

Exile: Escape from the Pit by Spiderweb Software. Taking it back to the '90s!

Planet mother fucking Algol

Jason and the Argonauts film (1963). Man those outfits were boss.

Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne.

Also: the Wilderlands, everyone's gaming blogs, the SRD, and a giant stack of reference works!

I can't really believe it myself, but Lovecraft doesn't actually get a mention. Land's End is much more pulpy and action-packed, it doesn't really have any sense of horror. There are some gross Lovecraftian monsters but the Chthulhu mythos doesn't even really make sense in the setting, except for a few veiled references.


[LATE EDIT: I forgot one absolutely VITAL component!!!]

So I started reading Against the Wicked City! That post about the Dragon Warriors games really grabbed me. I want to play in a game where the goblins have daggers made of icicles, and the wights lurk and loom grimly from their barrow-mounds! (Everything needs more wights.)

In the spirit of that post, let's see if we can't dig up some more goodness from around the internet that goes with this look - and increases our style points in general - and see where might fit in my game!

Go and read that article first, then come back and let's go on a journey. I started by looking for other "Dragon Warriors" images to see what else was out there, but that phrase was to say the least difficult to google precisely, so then I spread my net a bit wider for some more fun:



IN THE FORM OF A MONSTROUS GOAT.



A more English Elf. Actually, that book was really quite good.






Hunting on the moors at night!


Doré forever!! This adventure looks like it ended badly.


Doré, also note the ruined spiral staircase going nowhere - I want to see what that's all about.


Un-human based horror. I don't specifically have pig-men in my setting but a) House on the Borderland does not screw around, b) it's set in the UK (Scotland I think?), c) I have goat-men so why not, and 4) maybe I will have to work the pig-boys in.


I want to put this picture up the next time the PCs trip over a ruined castle. See if they even want to go inside!!



I dunno what this is about, I love it though.



CRAP I FORGOT ABOUT THE PRE-RAPHAELITES
They only work in certain doses, but definitely for some elfy stuff at times.
I'll just leave this here. For later.



BARROW-WIGHTS by Ian Miller. YES!!!



Semi-related, but this band actually rules.





Some really deadly artwork of all kinds of fantasy stuff, including a ton of Tolkien scenes, here. This guy rules!!!






Elves: because DiTerlizzi doesn't screw around. The Elven parts of Annwn will be a pretty strange place.



I'll bet her one spell for the day is pretty damn cool.