Review: Troika

I received a PDF of the "Troika! RPG" in one of the charity bundles I supported. Sadly, I don't even know which one. I didn't pay much attention to it at the time but the kickstarter has a bunch of people talking about the game in glowing terms again so I decided to see what the fuss was all about. Overall I was impressed and wished I'd looked at it sooner!

Daniel Sell and Jeremy Duncan created Troika and publish it under the Melsonian Arts Council.

It gives you a lot to work with in only 50 pages, but feels incomplete. It may not be an issue going forward because the new edition is projected to be nearly twice the page count and will come with a series of supporting chapbooks. Still, it's worth mentioning because I'm not sure if the brevity is a feature or a bug.

I like that the setting is baked into the rules. All of the character classes, called backgrounds here, are full of implicit setting information. The skills, the spells, and the handful of monsters, give you a strong sense of the setting. The way this is executed is great! These brief references to the world(s?) of Troika are an evocative way to root the different game elements to the setting without clogging up the game with pages of text. The problem is there is no other reference to the setting in the book. It's only implied, never described. For veteran gamers this setup is not a problem. The game master will simply run the version of the setting that blew up in their mind as they read the rules. Every group would be playing in their own unique version of Troika. I like this idea, but the game is billed as a good beginner role playing game. While the rules are easy, I think people new to RPGs would be a bit confused about what they should be doing and what is supposed to be going on in Troika.

The setting, as far as I can tell, is amazing and full of wonder. It takes place in a series crystalline spheres that hang in a "humpbacked sky" and serve as the stars for each other. It's possible to move between them on golden barges powered by mirrored sails. It also appears to be possible to fall out of one and land in another. Goblins seem to be able to connect underground labyrinths from one sphere to another. In these ways people and cultures from the different spheres mix with each other and adventurers have the option to get into all kinds of new brands of trouble. If things get stale in a long campaign the party need only move to another sphere to get a fresh start or new experience!

Troika is science fantasy, with a mix of swords, energy weapons, and magic. Personally I love the science fantasy, sword and planetesque style RPG setting. If you want a more pure fantasy game, the science fiction elements of Troika could be scrubbed out without much trouble. Certainly a lot easier than the old Star Wars RPG.

The rules are based on an RPG that grew out of series of solo adventure books. Both were called "Fighting Fantasy" and were apparently quite popular in the UK in the 1980s. Living in Canada, I never saw either and I don't remember any ads for them.

The system uses regular six-sided dice for everything but manages them to get a wide variety of results. The core of the system is 2d6 + base skill + advanced skill vs opponent or 2d6 to roll target number or under of the total skill (base skill + advanced skill). So if your character is using a hammer to fight an enemy you roll 2d6 add your skill and any skill you have in hammers and hope you get more than the GM does with 2d6 plus the enemy's skill. If your character is climbing a cliff, you need to roll 2d6 and get the total of your base skill and climb skill or less to succeed. Advanced skills are attached to specific things like climbing, etiquette, specific spells, and swords. I found it easy to grasp and good for all kinds of situations. The roll high sometimes, roll low others I find a bit irritating but it's hardly the first game I've played that switches back and forth.

A sample page from the character generation section with two backgrounds.

The book opens on character generation which is fast, random, and wild. I like character generation at the front of an RPG rule book, since it is the portion used the most. The system allows you to produce a character in a few minutes. There are no classes, but there are 36 backgrounds rolled for using d66 (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 21, 22, ... 65, 66). Because there is no class and level advancement these backgrounds are starting places for each player's character. The character improves the skills they use and learn new ones they spend time and effort on. With so many different starting places and no clear path forward, playing each character should be a unique experience.

The game only has three stats: skill, stamina and luck. Usually a game with so few stats ends up with little to differentiate the different characters from each other. In this case, Troika avoids that fate by having a long list of specific "advanced skills" that create the detail and flavour of each player character. It might be more accurate to say this game has one stat and two resources. The base skill is the raw talent the character can apply to any action and augment with a relevant skill if they have it. The stamina is the character's total effort that they use to take lumps and keep going or fuel their spells. It's recovered pretty quickly for an old school game. It is fairly close to 5e D&D's hit points in that respect. The character's luck is another resource they can spend to tip the balance in certain situations or as a saving throw. It's by no means certain, it is luck after all, but it can run out.

One thing I noticed with the advanced skills is there are none for social situations outside of etiquette. I'm guessing this comes from the creators relying on player skill and roleplay for situations that would call for a deception or insight roll in another system. Although the rules specifically invite the invention of more advanced skills, so it;s easy to adjust it to your play style.

The cover image from the game's first print run.

The backgrounds are summed up in a few paragraphs including starting equipment, skills, any special rules that apply and a brief description. The variety of backgrounds include some of the usual suspects with a handful of warriors, priests, and wizards each with a flavourful spin of its own. They also have odd things like a lost king from another sphere who no one has heard of. It turns our a king without a kingdom is just a random person in a crown with a high etiquette skill. The dwarves in Troika are not born, they are made by other dwarves. Each dwarf is an artistic achievement, except the poorly made dwarf character. To other creatures they look like an ordinary dwarf, but other dwarves either ignore them or have a discussion about their flaws and draw on them to emphasize the points made. There is definitely something for everyone in the list. A party randomly rolled of such options would be a motley crew and makes me think of the groups of characters found in Terry Prachett's Discworld.

The encumbrance system is streamlined and easy to use, but has a clever innovation for finding equipment in a hurry. Your character has 12 slots of carrying capacity before they become encumbered. Some items take multiple slots and others, like arrows, can be packed into one. Any time your character tries to grab an item you have stowed like a potion, or a crossbow bolt, you need to roll its position or higher on the list with 2d6. Otherwise they must stop and rummage through their belongings to find it. This set up means players need to "pack carefully" to keep the important stuff, like weapons and ammunition, within easy reach. It's a fun quirk and adds a sense of urgency and suspense to changing weapons or getting a rarely needed item.

The other big innovation is the initiative system. Players each put two tokens in a bag for their character while the game master puts in the appropriate number for the enemies' initiative and the end of round token. Tokens are pulled one at a time to determine the order in which each character or creature in the conflict acts. The bag is refilled and a new round starts when the end of round token is pulled, so it is possible some wont act in a given round while others act multiple times. This makes combat a completely chaotic mess where opportunities are taken as they come and sometimes you get caught flat footed! I love the idea of this system even though I'd need to dig out my poker chips or find something else to make it work.

For me, the section that could use the most expanding is the enemies section. The monsters are fantastic! The dragons are wonderful beings of light and thought, the manticores are brilliant bookworms living in splendor. Each monster entry only takes a few paragraphs and includes a d6 table of creature moods when they are met to keep the encounters unpredictable.

My favourite monster is the parchment witch. This is a long dead sorcerer that covers their bones and rotting sinew with leather, parchment, paper or vellum to hide their true nature. Their thin disguises are vulnerable to water and fire which can make things awkward. They can also wear someone's skin for about a week before it starts to rot and becomes useless. This one is so messed up and it doubles as one of the background options! The parchment witch is only part of the picture though. Some of the monsters are rooted in comedy, like the road knight that appears to be a reference to the black knight of Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail.

The magic system has a simple skill roll and stamina cost to keep spell casters in check. It also has an "Oops!" table for when the player rolls box cars. This system means magic is a bit unpredictable and dangerous without making the casters a constant danger to themselves and everyone around them. The spells themselves have enough variety and are flexible enough to be used in a wide variety of circumstances. This section is probably the most complete in the book.

The equipment section is brief, but doesn't appear to need anything more than it has. One thing I like is how the damage for different weapons is on a d6 table. Rolling a 1 on the d6 does dramatically different damage when the character is using a polearm than it does when they are using a knife. The weapons are defined by their damage spread and how they punch through armour. The armour is a simple damage reduction.

The art is consistent and good. It fits the contradictory elements of comedy, grittiness, and the strange captured by the text.

From a GM's point of view, this game is easy to run on the fly with heavy improv but doesn't need to be run that way for it to work. The stat blocks for monsters are skill/stamina/initiative so everything is there at a glance. The damage tables are in the back of the book so they are easily referenced. I will definitely run this game the first chance I get!

I like that it's not another in a long line of similar games with a twist. Like the d20 retro clones, the Fate games and the powered by the apocalypse games that are becoming legion. By using lesser known system as a jumping off point their game is all twist! Troika is different in a way I respond to. It reaches for the wonder found in the best science fantasy art and I think it's a good tool for a group to get there.

Like my review of The Black Hack, this one is a bit late. I think the reason is the same though. Both games have terrible names that don't inspire me. I thought Troika had something to do with eastern European legends, which I'm not overly interested in. The fact that it hits my sweet spot for crazy science fantasy with a magnificent mixture of awe, darkness and silly, is not referenced in the name. I asked Daniel Sell about the name and he said it was combination of it being the name of the tri-city that was the main population centre of the setting (something not in the book), a reference to the three stats, and something that sounded funny. I can't argue with that logic.

If you are looking for a tight, rules-light science fantasy game with a wide open setting, check out the kickstarter for the Numinous edition of Troika they are running now. It's already funded and the stretch goals will add to the supplementary setting and adventure material that this new version will have to expand what is at its core a solid game. So solid that I think we may see some Troika clones next year.

Have a crazy character sheet I found online.

Wonder vs Weird

The idea of Wonder verses Weird is one I've struggled with for a long time.

Kiel Chenier of Dungeons and Donuts fame started a thread on G+ back in March of 2015. He was talking about how the OSR seems to be caught up in the pursuit of the weird. According to his post old school gaming seems to be reaching toward more uncomfortable material and going for the ick factor while chasing the weird. What he's looking for from a gaming experience is wonder. The feeling of being taken aback by a scene and momentarily stopped by awe.

Wonder is a great thing to aim for in gaming but it's much harder to achieve than weird. I'd say the two of them are solutions to the same problem with most fantasy RPG material.

The majority of fantasy RPG material made in the last 40 years is based on the tolkienesque assumed setting of Dungeons and Dragons. There are certainly exceptions, but most fantasy games have the humans, elves, dwarves and halflings defending civilization against the evil creatures like orcs and dragons. These games influenced and inspired writers in the fantasy genre, entrenching these assumptions as "traditional fantasy" in RPGs and all kinds of other media like books, films and video games.

This common ground certainly makes entry into the hobby a bit easier since there is so much less explanation required. An introduction can be as short as saying the game is just like whatever movie, TV show or video game the person is familiar with that makes use of the common fantasy tropes and that's it. One sentence explanation. That easy summary has it's advantages, but it saps a lot of the wonder that comes from exploring something completely new.

That's not to say there was never wonder in D&D. I can remember opening up my Mentzer Red Box in total amazement at the scenes and creatures inside. I've seen that same look of wonder when I used the old Basic and Expert books to see if my daughters would want to play an RPG. They were blown away by what they saw and excited to explore the new world it showed them. The points of light in the "known world" setting worked well in terms of developing that sense of wonder as well. Civilization was in small pockets, slowly expanding into a wilderness full of monsters, ancient secrets and wild wonders. It's important to note that when I first encountered D&D I had not read any tolkien or his imitators. My exposure to fantasy by that point was small. Mostly books by Ursula K LeGuin and "historical" fiction with fantastic elements. I also read every Greek, Norse or Celtic myth and legend I could get my hands on. The only fantasy films I'd seen were Excalibur and Legend. When it came to D&D I took it all in like I was starving. Soaking up the elements of  Vance, Leiber, Moorcock and even Tolkien with all the wonder my ten-year-old brain could muster.

I started this post while musing about introducing a couple of brand new players to the RPG hobby and dealing with the pretty serious problem when it comes to wonder. As uber-geeks who have consumed all the fantasy and sci-fi pop-culture can provide there is little in the D&D multiverse that they haven't been exposed to at least in some part before. They had their players' handbooks and they'd read them cover-to-cover. The game itself held a sense of wonder in that it was a new experience and they have nothing on which to base expectations. They knew it has rules so they can count on it being something, but they can't know what that something is until they've tried it out and become familiar with it. If role playing is the novelty then they are likely to jump from campaign to campaign, and game to game and ultimately system to system looking for that feeling again. We played for the better part of a year before life got in the way. There was wonder as they explored the world and tried different things. The fact there was no edge to the map, that adventure could be found almost anywhere as long as they interacted with the world it would present endless possibilities to explore.

When I started playing D&D, and when I start any new campaign, the wonder comes from the world itself. A world with its own set of rules can hold its own wonder. Learning those rules, exploring the world for more surprises can provide all kinds of fun. But the more the world conforms to expectations, the more the players need to delve into the edges and dark corners to find something new, something that has its own set of rules.

That's how games like Call of Cthulhu and Lamentations of the Flame Princess build the impact of the adventures. They don't even try to provide wonder in the setting. They've given up that fight as unwinnable and built their world into the shadows of the one we have here. That's the foundation of the weird. It disrupts expectations instead of creating new ones. It changes and tears at the rules and assumptions. It also tends to be terrible in some way. The weird revels in the tension it creates but it needs the mundane as a contrast. Tension needs the norm to pull against.

Wonder is something different. It doesn't need to be grounded because it does't rely on tension. Wonder inspires awe. Lovecraft did it with his Cyclopean columns in the ancient ruins of unknowable peoples. Carroll did it with the dream-time logic of Wonderland. Fantasy and sci-fi has always had graceful or delicate towers reaching into the sky and strange people with customs that need to be unravelled to be understood.

Goblins, orcs and elves present little mystery these days. Even the fresh takes on the old themes are grounded in the common expectations surrounding these common fantasy creatures. How do I inject wonder into these common themes without disrupting them so completely they become weird? Does the audience matter? How much do I add to the basic framework of goblins and kobolds for my new players? Am I merely creating uncommon expectations they will attach to familiar names only to have them disrupted by their next group? Is that even fair? It's probably not necessary to change things dramatically to get that burst of wonder. No matter how the world is set up the players will figure out its mysteries and make it "normal" for them.

I've also been running games for my kids and their friends with the Black Hack. They don't know the rules and have zero expectations. They are developing them as they interact with the world and explore. Wonder is easy as each new thing is amazing. I could leave everything bog standard D&D and they would eat it all up, but I've made changes. These things, like goblins hatching from a queen's eggs fully grown, they accept as part of D&D. No matter what they read in rulebooks later, goblins will have queens and their nests will be an HR Geiger nightmare with a bloated queen and egg pods everywhere. Those changes are for me, not them.

For someone new to tabletop gaming the smallest brush against a fantasy trope can create wonder. I rolled an encounter for them at night and had a dragon fly over their camp. They didn't fight it. Their characters couldn't even see it. It was a silhouette revealed by the stars it blotted out above, but it blew their minds to be so close to a dragon! They talked about it for months as that time they saw the dragon with the wonder written all over their faces!

For adults, wonder seems easier for something like science fiction. Planetary romance or space opera can move from planet to planet. Each new planetfall brings a fresh world with its own set of rules and consistencies that need not relate to any other the characters have visited before. Even hybrids like Vance's Dying Earth where the long past of the Earth lays shadows on the world so that any location could be out of sync with the campaign would the characters already know. I think that is the draw of games like Traveller or even the Planescape and Spelljammer settings of D&D. The perpetual need to explore, to figure out the rules of the current locale and the wonder they present.

Many of the small press fantasy creators focussed on the disruptive and weird in the past few years, but it's the stuff that captures a sense of wonder as well that seems to gain the most traction and be talked about in the most glowing terms. I think when people use words like "original" and "different," they are really talking about the sense of wonder they found reading or playing it.

The little products that snag ENnies and get talked about with such passion online are the ones that present worlds with new rules that create a whole new set of expectations through play. A few examples that spring to mind are A Red and Pleasant Land, Yoon Suin, and Veins of the Earth. All three of these present new worlds. The two LotFP releases straddle the weird by having entrances to the real/normal campaign world with a R&PL on the other side of the looking glass and Veins laying deep below the surface, beyond the deepest dungeon or mine. Yoon Suin is a place that can be entered by ship like the original Tékumel where your players need to figure out how things work and find a place in it. All three have their own systems for just about everything and incredible visuals that can deliver the wonder missing from the muddy roads linking the pseudo-european fantasy settings that have all started to look like New Zealand since 2001.

Maybe the audience doesn't matter. Maybe the need for wonder is my own no matter if I'm playing or running. I think for my next campaign setting I need draw inspiration from the crazy fantasy illustrations and paintings that have no limits like the work of someone like Moebius. Start with visuals full of wonder and build a fantasy world that makes sense with that.

Plans for Carcosa...

Geoffrey McKinney's latest version of the controversial D20 RPG supplement called Carcosa was published by James Raggi's Lamentations of the Flame Princess back in 2011. It's had plenty of reviews so you won't see that here. The publisher is all out of Carcosa books and there's only a handful of new copies to be had now anyway, so a review would be kind of pointless. This post is all about how I plan to use this book of weird stuff.

You might think my timing is odd since it's three years later and the thing is at the end of its print run. That's true, but today I came across the information that McKinney is close to half-way finished a companion to the first Carcosa book that has a bit more detail on how the world of Carcosa works. He still has it arranged as a hex crawl, he's just providing a lot more information in each hex. All of that information together would allow the GM and players moving chacters through them to build a better picture of how life on Carcosa actually works.

This new development got me thinking again about what I wanted to do with this book that I've had on my shelf for a few years now.

Carcosa is an awful place full of amoral peoples, cultures and creatures. It's a cruel, nasty world that is moved by horrific rituals and covered with dinosaurs and shambling creatures out of H.P. Lovecraft's nightmares. It should be a something of a shock to players who are used to more traditional fantasy and science fiction settings. I think that's where the fun of the setting can be found and developed.

I think the best party to have in Carcosa would be explorers from our world or a close approximation of it. The first time I read this book I thought it would be cool to trap a team from earth in it like the film Stargate. A team of specialists from modern times (anywhere from WWI era to right now) could go through an ancient gate to the world of Carcosa. The timing for this trip would be bad and they would enter during some kind of event that destroys the gate on the Carcosa side before they can figure out how to return through it. Now the party has a simple goal: Find a way home. They could chase rumours and technology all across the map.

Since attrition is a natural part of the game and the Player Characters from earth would need to be replaced by locals when they died, the party that finally found the gate back to earth might be entirely Carcosan. It's only natural that the party would find locals to help them as guides and translators. These people would naturally want to leave Carcosa for the amazing land of Earth where they need not live in fear of terrible creatures or dying as a sacrifice in some horrific summoning ritual. A place where food is plentiful and people live and work together in what would seem insane luxury would be an impossible dream for the humans of Carcosa. I picture what would eventually become a party of mixed-colour Carcosans speaking English and wearing bits of earth-made kit as they cross Carcosa looking for clues to get to the promised land.

I'd play everything in Carcosa pretty much as it is written. I'd even use all the nutty dice conventions, at least for a while. I'd have everyone roll for psionics the first time they encounter a minion of the old ones like a shoggoth or a psionic-using creature. That's the easy part. My biggest decision would be deciding on a system to use and the modifications to the classes for their modern interpretations.

I've thought it through with the Lamentations of the Flame Princess: Weird Fantasy RPG System. For anyone unfamiliar with LotFP, it's a D20 RPG based on the Basic/Expert books of the early 80s with some innovations and changes that push the tone of the game towards exploration of the unknown and horror. Carcosa is designed to be played with those rules so it would be fairly easy to have a group roll up a bunch of appropriate fighters and specialists. I'm playing a lot of 5e D&D lately though, and I can see how well the conventions in the Carcosa rules could work with 5e D&D. It is tempting to make some adjustments and use the new D&D rules to play. NOTE: at the time I'm writing this post the 5e DM's guide is not yet available. It may have advice on running in a modern setting like earlier versions did.

Making a list of kit that everyone has like E-Tools (folding shovels), canteens and ration packs is not a big deal. It could even be fun since things like solar charging units and laptops are not out of the question. Firearms need to be addressed though.

The firearms rules in LotFP could be adjusted for faster rates of fire and loading. For automatic weapons a long burst (full mag, minimum 20 rounds) could do two dice damage in a cone area of affect with a save verses devices for half. A short (or long for that matter) burst on an individual could add +1 to hit for every round used beyond the first. So holding the trigger down for a five-round burst would get a +4 attack bonus. This would need to be declared before the roll to hit. Anyone other than a fighter would a die six and add the even number rolled divided by two and subtract the odd number rolled to the desired amount of rounds used. For 5e the long burst as a cone would work the same but the short burst on a single target would be 3-5 rounds (D3+2) and would give the attacker Advantage on the roll to hit. Grenades could just use the Carcosa grenade rules. I'd give everyone five full 30-round clips and maybe include a box or two of ammo for the group.

The thing I like about 5e in Carcosa is the healing in 5e is based on Hit Dice. That means players could recover lost Hit Dice after a rest and have them to roll for the next encounter.  It just fits so elegantly into the system and solves the problem of healing slowing down a party in Carcosa. The unpredictable dice conventions of Carcosa and general lethality of 5e mean the stakes in any given fight will be high regardless.

The players would need to build a team. Such a group would be hand-picked for certain skills and trained together as a unit. The fact that they would likely have an expert on antiquities/ancient technology/cultures/myth since such a person might have been needed to get the gate up and running in the first place means the modern party could contain a wizard. Everyone would be human. In 5e that means feats would be available so at least one of the party would need to take the feat that allows for extra languages and talent for linguistics (like Daniel Jackson in the aforementioned film Stargate). It's possible this character would be a 5e bard who is a lore specialist and would be included for the first contact team for cultural adaptation and communication. In LotFP it would just be a specialist with the languages skill. The team would also include a medic so LotFP could add the Medical skill to the specialist skills and the 5e player could take the Healer feat. A sniper in 5e is just an Assassin but in LotFP it could be a Specialist with Stealth, Sneak Attack and pips for +1 attack bonus with a rifle. A close-combat specialist would be a fighter in LotFP and possibly a monk in 5e.

Some classes for 5e would need to be removed. Paladins, Clerics and Druids just would not fit. Sorcerers, Rangers, Eldritch Knights and Arcane Tricksters also don't work well with the setting material, having no real place in either world. I'd remove them as well. Warlocks with an Old One as a patron fit well but the other patrons would not be available. In fact, I'd be tempted with a 5e game to remove the Carcosa Sorcerer class and rework the Pact of the Tome to be the ability to learn and cast the Carcosa list of rituals. That would mean all the NPC Sorcerers listed in the book would be Warlocks. Wizards could stay the same but would be extremely rare, super-scientist types.

It would make for a long and satisfying campaign. Especially if the party actually succeeds in returning to Earth with a pile of alien technology. Players could play in the gonzo sandbox that is Carcosa and I could ramp up the evil nature of the setting while the players played PCs with a positive value system totally out of whack with the world.

Still Searching... and the Mash-Up!

My first couple of posts came really close together so the time since may have a few of you thinking that I've given up on this whole blogging thing already. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

First of all, I hope to get a post out at least once per week. To me that means any time in a seven day period so it's possible to have as much as 12 or 13 days between posts. Don't panic! And don't worry, this isn't just a "hey I'm still here" post. I'll include some actual content in this post too.

Speaking of content, I've been thinking about what I want to have up here. Obviously I want it to be interesting and that may be enough when it comes to some of my choices. When it comes to the things I write about gaming  though, I'd like it to be interesting and useful. That means this thing is going to be an eclectic bucket of random gaming goodness. Sure my tastes run toward the old school set, but I am a polygamerist at heart so you might see just about anything up here. The one thing you can count on is if it's here, it's something I want to use at my table.

For the next post I'm going to try out an idea that I may use again, depending on how much fun it is and the response. So stay tuned for the Retro-Speculative! I'll be tearing up an old game from the days of yore and reapplying it to a different genre.

But for now, the Mash-Up!

I love a good mash-up! Mixing together two intellectual properties has a lot of advantages when it comes to creating a setting for play. It wipes the slate clean as far as what the players know about the world. If you've only read three Conan short stories and want to use it in a game because it's so cool and one of your players has read every Conan story ever written by all of the authors that took up the character after Howard and has maps of Hyboria on the wall, you might run into some issues with the player knowing more about the world than you do. The easiest way to fix that is to add more cool things! So you like the theme of the value of the barbarian over civilization that runs through the Conan stories, but you also enjoy the fatalism of Vance's Dying Earth? Perfect! Smash them together and make something new and even more fun to play in. Instead of the world being new, it's impossibly ancient and more decadent than even the most noble Hyborians could have dreamed. Still, such a place always has its frontiers and wild places. Untamed lands will still produce men and women like Conan.

I say it's more fun for the players as well because that blank slate gives everyone more room to roam. All the stories belong to the players. There are no principal characters to cast shadows over the campaigns. There are also no characters with script immunity walking around (unless you put them there).

What I love about the mash-up is how good it can go if you put together things that seem like they could never fit. The process of roping together opposites in a way that makes sense and is compelling can give you something better than either of the two things you started with. For instance, mashing up Firefly and Farscape is kind of pointless because they are both science fiction about a small group of criminals on the run from powerful governments who just do their best to make ends meet and keep moving. One has aliens, the other has cowboys. Not much of a gap to bridge with new ideas there.

You need friction between the two settings to get that creative spark going. The farther they are apart, the more original the new setting will feel when you have it.

I've been mulling over one of these "impossible" mash-ups over on G+ for a while now. Some smart people have chimed in and I can see it growing into a setting that might see some play in the next few months. What I'm talking about is my idea to put together Ursula K LeGuin's Earthsea and Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom. It turns out melding a desert world with an archipelago is not as hard as I thought it would be.

Luckily I had the forethought to hashtag the posts with #Barsoomsea so I can share part of what I have so far:

The Archipelago could gain the same fatalism of Barsoom by having the water raise instead of recede. If the trackless sea replaces the desert then it only needs to rise to consume the world the way the drought does on Barsoom to convey the sense of doom that hangs over those stories.

I picture fishing villages where the docks and piers are built onto the roofs of the houses the sea claimed as the villages build on higher and higher ground every generation.

The green men could be replaced by a race of amphibians who live in the sea in between the islands. They fight with the humans because they need the land to lay and hatch their eggs. A process that takes years.

Some intrepid folk might sail out beyond the relative safety of the Archipelago searching for more and higher land. They might even find the ruins of lost empires half swallowed by the sea, with only their greatest forts and towers remaining on the cliffs and mountaintops.

In rare and exciting times a volcanic eruption might bring a new island to the surface. All such islands carry terrors from the depths that must be tamed. Some of these mountains are surfacing for a second time, covered in the ruins of buildings from a forgotten age. These ruins could have anything inside but who is willing to go and look?

The slow loss of the world has left the populace of the Archipelago with a strange mixture of half forgotten science and sorcery saved or recovered from the past while ordinary folk toil as they always have, fishing and farming while clinging to the land that remains.

People fight with the sea, the amphibians, each other, and the results of their own schemes or vanities. There should be plenty of room for adventure in such a place.

With no set mythology, all kinds of things can find their way into this new Archipelago. Islands on the backs of ancient turtles? Flotillas of boats lashed together and surfaced with dirt to make floating farming communities? It's all on the table because there's no expectation or history to disrupt. And even if we just start with the premise above, what we have feels similar to both settings but doesn't copy either of them.

What do you think? Should #Barsoomsea have some kind of airships gracefully travelling from one island peak to another? Do you have a better mash-up?