Loviatar no. 9 Progress Report: Off We Go

It took me a while to get the issue sorted out in my head, but now I'm ready to press forward. Hex 005 is going to tie together some ideas I kicked around in my old Iridia zine, as well as the current hex crawl and the Planescape series. 

     The PCs in Hex 005 can visit the tower where Abel Artone saved his lady love, Apris the Wondrous. This was back in Iridia no. 9, published May 29, 2006. A line from that issue read, "Within, the trio met and defeated the remaining ogre brother. (The party had slain the other prior to encountering Balnor the dwarf in Iridia 6.)" For those of you keeping score at home, Balnor was that wanker prospector defiling The Stone Man's altar in Hex 003. 

     In my mind, "defeated" is not the same as slain, so I think the defeated ogre is still alive, exploring new and disgusting culinary methods. I imagine that he is horribly scarred from the battle and terribly bitter. He does, however, have a healthy respect for adventuring types. Abel, of course, has passed on and now wanders the Outlands, perfectly at ease. (We'll see him again in a future issue of Loviatar.)

     I don't know why it took me so long to figure out how I wanted to integrate the tower into the issue, but it did. A lot of it hinged upon how to present the ogre, as well as Morgan Stringman. He's back again and he's working hard to protect the owl that has carried away a few halflings (See Hex 003). His protection of the owl could put him at odds with Lawful characters. I think it'd be fascinating to have the PCs attempt to kill the owl to claim a bounty and then have to kill Morgan when he attempts to fight for the owl's life. In play - as in real life - I am fascinated by friendships that suddenly turn bitter when the principles of one or both parties are put in opposition.

     I have decided that Vampire: The Requiem will return. I'm making my way through the Ventrue of Santa Fina and the lovely Veronica has been whispering into my ear that the clan needs more attention. I do not see any conflict between the Hex series and Vampire. As many of you have noticed, there's a lot of WoD in terms of tone and structure to the hex crawl.

     Okay, gotta go. Every word written here is one less word written in the zine.