Mythic Underworld: Chthonic Deities

The Greek word χθόνιος (chthonios) referred to the ground, but in a specific way, meaning "underground" or what we would call the underworld. Today we refer to Hades, Persephone and other underworld gods as the chthonic deities. Despite any superficial resemblance, the word is unrelated to the work of H.P. Lovecraft; it's pronounced "thonic" or "k-thonic".

Even in antiquity, Hades was referred to as Zeus Chthonios, giving him a role as an underground ruler. This is reinforced by his staff, a symbol of authority, which typically had two tines, as opposed to the three of Poseidon's better-known trident. The Romans particularly conflated him with multiple other chthonic gods, creating the distinct god Pluto.

Generally we treat the Roman gods as simply renamed versions of their Greek counterparts, but even the name "Pluto" came from a separate Greek god, Πλοῦτος (Ploutos). The conflated deity symbolized both the underworld (which took on the name "Hades") and wealth, which of course originated from mines deep under the earth. Pluto was also combined with the Roman chthonic god Orcus; while the name is familiar to D&D fans, the image of the god itself is even weirder:

(This is taken from a 16th century monument, the Gardens of Bomarzo, but I didn't feel like I could do chthonic gods justice without it. And it's a great dungeon entrance.)

Aside from his obvious D&D namesake, the name "Orcus" is probably the inspiration for such diverse creatures as ogres, orcs, and the killer whales called orcas. Not surprisingly, he was less of a stoic underworld-ruler and more of a black, hairy death god, surviving from the ancient Etruscan myths. As a bonus, Orcus was the son of Eris (Roman name Discordia), thrower of the infamous Golden Apple that initiates the Trojan War. Pluto more generally was not a death god, however; that function went to Thanatos, a relatively minor god.

The combined Pluto has a symbol of a key, which he also shared with Persephone, and a cornucopia - a horn of plenty. The key was also a symbol used in the Eleusinian Mysteries; the initiate was sealed with a golden key, variously described as on the tongue or the lips, indicating the secrecy of the mysteries they had been taught. Keys could also indicate the riches that would come from the earth, both in crops and in underground mines.

In some myths, Hades is the father of the Erinyes, or Furies, also known as the Eumenides (the Kindly Ones). This literal euphemism is an ancient way of not referring to deities by name. The Erinyes were vengeance deities; of course, they also have AD&D analogues. Persephone is said to have had a daughter Melinoë, also identified with the goddess Hecate, who is described in the Orphic hymns as "Now plain to the eye, now shadowy, now shining in the darkness," and is said to give men nightmares and drive them mad.

There is obvious gaming material here, even aside from Orcus and the Erinyes showing up. I really love the symbolism of a golden key related to underworld secrets. The key can unlock secrets of the underworld, hidden treasures, or truths of life, death, and immortality. It can also be a common bond among characters who have truly been to the underworld and survived - its secrets may not be passed on lightly to every foolhardy newcomer, but to someone who has the key it is revealed. And of course the form may be either physical - a key or key-shaped artifact, or a symbol, drawing, poem, book or other entity that serves as "the golden key."

I also find the idea of Melinoë tempting. As a granter of nightmares, such a character explains why the PCs can't constantly hole up and camp in "cleared" dungeon rooms. Haunting dreams and potential insanity wait for those unsound enough to sleep in the underworld. Her shifting, elusive character also seems like it would be ideal for monsters, and she is tied in with witches and necromancers, which fits perfectly. If you wanted to use a "Petty Gods" approach where low-level deities were actually present in the game world, Melinoë would be a good fit. The Erinyes are an interesting fix for murderhobo type activity that goes beyond normal cruelty.

Lastly, in spirit the triad of judgmental Hades, generous Pluto, and savage Orcus are a brilliant match for how a dungeon should be designed. It should be serious and otherworldly, but with great riches hidden in secret places, and sudden terrible violence should be a norm. These are very much the gods who direct the underworld of a D&D dungeon.

Mythic Underworld: Cerberus and Mysteries

The story of the twelve labors of Heracles is simple. Driven mad by the goddess Hera, he killed his own children. Since this was such an awful deed, he was given ten labors by Eurystheus to expiate himself; technicalities allowed Eurystheus to add two additional labors. The twelfth, capturing the hound Cerberus, is the one we're interested in.

Cerberus (the "C" is hard) is the guard-dog of Hades, who prevents unwanted access to the underworld. He is usually depicted with three heads, although in connection with the Hecatoncheires (100-handed giants), may have had 50 or 100 heads, some of which may have been snake heads. And he had snake tails, or several backs. In any case, you've got a nasty beast that stops the dead from escaping the realm of Hades.

As Heracles prepared to enter the underworld and retrieve Cerberus, he was initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries. This was a rite of knowledge, granting Heracles insight into the secrets of Persephone and Hades, and is certainly notable because it is the earliest reference to Greek mystery religions. So armed with new understanding, Heracles descended into the realm of Hades.

It's not exactly clear how Heracles got Cerberus out. Some accounts have him wrestling the beast and beating it, possibly involving the impenetrable skin of the Nemean Lion that Heracles used as a cloak. Others say that Persephone, who thought kindly of Heracles, gave the hero a chain, or possibly that she herself chained the beast and handed it over. The fight makes the more obvious of the two stories, but it's intriguing to think about the hero winning the fight by getting Persephone on his side.

Of course, Eurystheus did not actually want Cerebus, and Heracles returned the beast to its proper place in Hades after having brought it up to the surface. This last bit is probably the most amusing part of the tale; unlike the Lernaean Hydra or the Nemean Lion, Cerebus is not a menace to be slain. Hell is supposed to have a three-headed dog-beast who eats anyone trying to leave.

If all we got for gaming from the tale was Cerberus as guard-dog, that'd still be an interesting twist on the dungeon guardian. After all, Cerberus was not there to keep intruders out, but to pen the denizens of the underworld in. I really like the idea of a formidable monster that is not necessarily an immediate threat for PCs to overcome, but plays a role in the dungeon's ecology nonetheless. Some groups will try to kill simply anything, but that can always be solved by a powerful creature that refuses to offer direct combat. Of course, at some point the PCs will have to deal with the creature – but by that time it will become a strategic obstacle to overcome.

Then there's the little matter of the Eleusinian mysteries. This is a secret initiation ritual that gives hidden knowledge; in many cases this hiddenness was quite literal, and the content of the mysteries have been lost to the ages. Such an initiation is a way to integrate player characters more deeply into the setting. We are used to scriptural religion in the West, but introducing a mystery is an opportunity to create literally esoteric knowledge about the world, which can be revealed to players only when their PCs make a particular commitment. PCs, of course, will be inclined toward the mysteries that grant knowledge of the dungeon underworld they face.

The last idea that I particularly like is the loan of a chain from Persephone. This is a good way to have a taste of powerful artifacts in the campaign, by lending them instead of permanently giving them to the PCs. Most artifacts throw off the ability of PCs to be meaningfully challenged, but having them given on short-term loan lets them flavor the game without dominating it.

However many heads Cerebus has, the story of Heracles subduing him has a lot of interesting wrinkles for the D&D underworld. I do want to tackle more Mythic Underworld segments, because Greek myth alone has a lot to offer in this regard.

Worldbuilding and the Reference Problem

A well-known episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation, "Darmok," uses the concept of a race of aliens that eludes the Trek convention of a universal translator because they speak in metaphorical references to their history and mythology. Picard doesn't understand what they are talking about until the myth about uniting against a common foe is explained to him.

This closely resembles a problem that worlds built for fantasy roleplaying will naturally have. Unless the referee invents an elaborate cultural history and the players study it, there are very few ways to create symbols, signs or references that the players can put together on their own initiative. For instance, most people reading this would recognize the symbolism of a white rabbit, a mad hatter or the Red Queen, because Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass are part of our shared cultural history. Puzzles, riddles or clues based on Carroll's Alice novels are something that a referee can use and reasonably expect players to figure out what they are doing. But not so for an arbitrary fantasy equivalent of the white rabbit.

One way around the problem is what I'll call the Tékumel solution. In the original Empire of the Petal Throne game, the assumption was that the players start off as outland barbarians entering into Jakálla for the first time. The elaborate culture only had to be detailed in broad strokes; specifics would be learned later in the campaign. Generally this works by having an elaborate history that exists, but is not known by the players or their characters. But until a substantial amount of information is revealed to the players, references are not something we can rely upon as drivers for puzzles and clues.

A second solution is to set everything on a fantasy Earth. Lamentations of the Flame Princess has chosen this approach; the game is now set in 17th century Europe, leaving it ripe for reference to real-world literature, myth and superstition. This solution works, but sharply limits the amount of worldbuilding we are able to do. You get Earth and all the baggage that comes with it, good and bad.

But I do see a middle ground that still allows players to understand references without resorting to either fantasy Earth or barbarians in Jakálla solutions — what I'll call the Deities & Demigods method. D&DG, like its predecessor Supplement IV: Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes, was not an encyclopedia of original deities, but rather a listing of real-world mythological beings, mixed with a smattering of common fantasy pantheons (Hyboria, Nehwon, and in early printings, Cthulhu and Melniboné) that referees could incorporate into their own campaigns. Inserting them into a fantasy world allows you to have real heroes, legends and deities accessible, and the attendant literary references.

None of this precludes having fantasy religion in the campaign as well. Real-world religions can be one pantheon among others, and it can also be incorporated in a way that's entirely appropriate to D&D: just like in the real-world middle ages, ancient paganism can be a thing of the distant past, that is nevertheless known as history to the characters. This is a good way of making it so that the PCs have about the same level of knowledge about your mythic references as the players do.

There are still challenges, such as the fact that the putative language the PCs are speaking is not really English and real English puns and jokes shouldn't work, but this is at least a framework I think can be useful for incorporating real-world mythology and creating puzzles, riddles, and other references that make sense to the players and their characters alike.

Weird and Remote Tribes

Ancient historians and chroniclers were fascinated by stories about weird tribes. The two world-spanning histories that come down to us from antiquity, Herodotus's Histories and Pliny the Elder's Natural History, are replete with tales of bizarre tribes that were similar to humanity but not quite the same. These are all great material for weird and somewhat savage characters in roleplaying games. I've included some images of these types from the Nuremburg Chronicle.

I've written before about the dog-headed cynocephali but they are hardly the only ancient tribe that was generally like humanity, but with a small twist or two. The Arimaspoi pictured to the left, for instance, are human-sized but have only one eye; one has to imagine that their skill with missiles is not significant. In Herodotus, they were the enemies of gold-hoarding gryphons, and lived outside of the idyllic Hypberborea. They make a great substitute for cavemen or similar tribes in mountains or caves.

Blemmyes are a tad bit harder to understand. We know they didn't have heads — Herodotus called them akephaloi and located their eyes in their chests, while Pliny said they were in the shoulders. Our artist, following Pliny, gave them a nose and mouth in their chests, which may seem awkward but does make sense; the nose is closer to the lungs, and the mouth to the stomach, than in a human.

What is strange is whether or not the headless men are supposed to be intelligent; the name may literally mean "brainless," implying a frightful savage type.

The Chronicler also drew a great picture of the sciapods — literally meaning "shadow foot," a mythic type described by the great comic playwright Aristophanes and our Pliny. They had a single gigantic foot that they would use to shade themselves. They leap surprisingly well for all that. Not much else is known of them, but there are reports of their existence from India and Ethiopia throughout the whole of history when traveler's tales and rumor were the only hints anyone had of the world beyond a very narrow boundary.

Then there are the diminutive pygmies, who were skilled with slings, rode on goats, and were engaged in continuous warfare with cranes. Yes, the birds. The cranes were supposed to have stones in their gullets that could be used to test for gold, a tremendously useful sort of thing. And I just have to love the Chronicle's picture of a well-dressed pygmy fighting birds with a big club and a proper buckler shield, a true study in contrasts. If you don't like Tolkienesque hobbits, a semi-savage race of bird-fighters might be a good substitute.

Each of these tribes, and several other types (troglodytae who went from cave-dwelling humans to inhuman monsters, myrmidons who were supposed to have sprung from ants, amazons and others) were always off in the furthest known stretches of land - north of the barbarian tribes you knew in Europe, south of Ethiopia or east of India. They are probably based on innuendo, rumor and ignorance, and grew in the imaginations of travelers.

I like these tribes because they can fill a lot of different roles in a game, much like humans, but give it a feel that is a bit more fantastical than your vanilla people. The Nuremberg Chronicle's art hints at the critical ambiguity where you just aren't sure which side a people stands on. The cynocephali and arimaspoi are wearing robes that might imply civilization, while the naked hair-covered woman (a member of the tribe known as the gorgades) or the blemmyes speak of savagery through and through. You just don't get that with the cursus honorum of humanoids; goblins and orcs are for killing, and not much more.

Once expectations have been upset, of course, the door is also open for NPC members of these tribes to advance in various classes and levels. A one-eyed sorcerer or a fierce headless warrior can be a fascinating foe or ally — obviously depending on circumstances and alignment. Some can also have various types of shamans, witch-doctors and the like, as tribal types are inclined to.

You can see all of the Nuremburg Chronicle's odd people at Wikimedia Commons, and there is a terrific resource for Greco-Roman mythological tribes over at the Theoi Greek Mythology site. And drop me a line if you use these types in your game.

Dungeon Crawl #4 - Chivalry, Sagas and Scheherazade

I was happy with the content of Dungeon Crawl #3 and its reception, but overall too much of the magazine was written with my byline. I'd really like to get a diversified crew on board for the fourth issue, for both longer articles and shorter pieces written by other people.

The theme for the fourth issue of Dungeon Crawl is medieval legends and mythology. This is a broad category with several fields within it, and I'd welcome submissions that are inspired by any of the following:

• Chivalric Romances. Any of the chansons de geste in either the English (Arthur) or French (Charlemagne) cycles and their descendants.
• Teutonic and Norse Myth. Think of the Nibelungenlied, the Sagas of the Icelanders, and by coincidence also Beowulf.
• Folkloric heroes of the type of Robin Hood and William Tell.
• Non-European medieval legends and folklore. Think The One Thousand and One Nights and generally Arabic / Persian stories.

Of course, the key here is "inspired by." That's a fairly broad category; whether you want to do a sandbox with a Sherwood Forest vibe, a dungeon out of the One Thousand and One Nights, magic items inspired by the Germanic myths, or monsters out of the chivalric tales, there should be plenty of ground to cover.

Submissions for Dungeon Crawl #4 are due by October 31. Send ideas to wrossi81 at gmail to confirm. Anything from a single monster up to a multi-page adventure is welcome.

Artifacts, Mythology and Impression of Depth

As I've been thinking about Swords & Wizardry for the upcoming appreciation day, one of the few things that S&W Complete didn't use from the OD&D supplements that I'd actually want in a game was the artifacts from Eldritch Wizardry. For me, artifacts were always an excellent part of the shared mythology of Dungeons & Dragons; having started with the 1991 set and gone on to AD&D 2e, the artifacts were the most colorful and interesting parts of the DMG. Of course it told you basically not to use them, which meant that in my earliest games I wanted to use them. Later when I got involved in online communities they provided one of the touchstones of stuff that every gamer knew and shared in some way. Even today you should recognize that the picture for this post is the Hand of Vecna.

One of the important things that artifacts provided for the game was the creation of the illusion that the world has a rich history behind it even if it doesn't. Not every fantasy world should require the depth of imagined material as Glorantha or Tékumel or Middle-Earth, Hârn or the Forgotten Realms. As much as I love reading fantasy setting material, I think worlds with sketchier backgrounds are better for some kinds of gaming when not everybody needs a strong familiarity with years (in many cases, now decades) of intricate detail.

In some cases, less is more. I don't know what a wind Duke is, or where and what Aaqa is, but the Wind Dukes of Aaqa that I invented in my head on hearing the name are cooler than the ones detailed out in the late '90s by Wizards of the Coast employees. Just like the Clone Wars I imagined as a kid are better than any media adaptation of them from 2002 onward. It takes a master storyteller to get something legendary really right, and having a mediocre version is sometimes worse than having a vague legend that you fill in yourself.

I like artifacts in a couple of other, more game-related senses. First, they transcend the concept of the "typical" magic item and become special because of their uniqueness. The fact that a good artifact should have at least some downside really reinforces this: magic is something special, not a sort of technology. Second, they are good for higher-level play, giving a viable goal aside from gaining levels and getting treasure. Since they are legendary, they let characters connect and become legends of their own through their deeds - rather than just rich and possibly famous.

Exactly what artifacts are has been discussed before; relics are kind of an odd subject. Of course "relics" are physical pieces of saints, such as bones, teeth and hair. For instance, Roland's sword Durendal was supposed to have a tooth, blood and some hair from various saints as well as a piece of the Virgin Mary's garments in its hilt. Such things can give mystery to an artifact, but not necessarily act as one itself, unless like Vecna's hand it's a whole body part. (At this point I would be remiss not to link to the Head of Vecna.)

One question on artifacts that's interesting to me is the way they are presented in the AD&D 1e Dungeon Master's Guide. Each artifact is presented with a number of power "slots" for the referee to fill out on their own. In a way I like this, since it means that artifact powers remain a mystery even to players who have the books. That can be a hard thing to do, although it does strip out some flavor. I'd probably prefer a hybrid solution, with some "set" powers and some "open" powers, so that the artifacts retain their mystery but have flavor appropriate abilities and drawbacks. It certainly beats the way magic items ended up in later editions.

So I think some artifacts will be part of Dungeon Crawl #3. If there is enough interest over time, I'd like to put out a whole booklet full of the things, complete with new tables and rules for artifact powers. It seems like they're just a missing part of the OSR field at this point.