What if... RL had been a 1E Horrorpunk campaign setting?

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Skyrock
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What if... RL had been a 1E Horrorpunk campaign setting?

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Some of you might have heard of Mazes & Minotaurs - the "what if..." RPG that answers the question what would have been if Gygax and Arneson had based the world's first RPG on Greek mythology and Hercules technicolor films instead on medieval Tolkien Sword & Sorcery.

The other night I had an idea that goes into a similar direction: What if in the mid-1980s, shortly after I6 came out, some D&D playing Horrorpunk fan influenced by the early Misfits, The Cramps, 45 Grave and other contemporary music (and of course their stylistic inspiration, old and bad horror movies) had decided to unofficially flesh it out as a campaign setting years before TSR did?
Obviously, it would use a lot of Horror references like saucer-riding martians, radioactive giant ants and Rosemary's Baby that haven't seen much play in Ravenloft as we know it today. Its layout would probably also rather follow the aesthetique of punk zines and early Horrorpunk artworks (crude skull doodles, stills from old horror movies cut and pasted from magazines, typewritten text sections literally cut and pasted to the page and then being xeroxed...) (you can look at the Gorehound zine at Archive.org for an example - it is some 10 years too young, but the style is the same but for the URLs provided in the articles.)
There'd also be a lot of OSR tropes (lots of random tables, world simulation before story).
It also wouldn't tip-toe so lightly around mature themes as Satanic Panic era TSR did (and name Devils, Demons and Daemons as it sees it) and have a lot of gonzo and attitude ahead of the Black Box incarnation, so it probably wouldn't be viable for hosting by the FoS. It still sounds like an idea worth pursuing, both as an RPG redesign and for the visual art aspect.

Looking at the Black Box domains from a Horrorpunk POV:
  • Arak: What if that domain was run by the Mole People and/or the Morlocks instead of the ubiquitious drow of late D&D?
  • Arkandale: This domain has always been boring and more of a transition area than something you seek out as a place to explore. I'd make it the home for American Colonial Horror stories like the Roanoke mystery, Sleepy Hollow or H.P. Lovecraft's The Curse of Yig, as well as related American urban legends like that of Satan's Hollow or Clinton Road. Add some savage natives (actually werewolves) and rumors of gold-filled ruins their more advanced ancestors built, and you've got a viable domain. White Water for the Intellivision might also make for an interesting contemporary inspiration.
  • Bluetspuer: Instead of mindslayers, the constant overland lightning stems from Martian saucers, and underground you will find atomic giant ants. The local darklord may be the A.I. running the Martian mothership, of which other saucers may only break off briefly to haunt the night skies of other domains to lay down rays, burn crop circles and abduct people. This is essentially the nexus point between Gothic Horror and 1950s Martian attacks/Atomic horror/Mad Science. Also your source of rayguns and other sci-fi toys if you want to ramp up the gonzo factor of your Horrorpunk Ravenloft.
  • Borca: One thing that always struck me as odd about Borca how it is all about the Borgias and their poisoning ways in Renaissance Italy, yet it is a very stable domain with a single, unquestioned leader. It would need to become larger and more fractured. The inclusion of Dorvinia in later editions was a start, but it would need to go further to be a good fit. I might also shake up the geography and put it on its own peninsula, like real world Italy is.
  • Darkon: The purposefully boring domain where all the beloved non-humans for standard D&D are found. Given that this is a demake, I may actually downplay this aspect and scatter non-humans more across the lands. Not many other ideas, as Darkon always struck me as an uninspired and half-hearted effort to reach out to fans of Mystara, Krynn, Faerun and other traditional D&D settings. I may actually end up erasing it completely from the demake.
  • Dementlieu: What if instead of mesmerism, Bodysnatchers were the driving force of the domain... and Dominic d'Honaire were simply Patient Zero instead of the origin?
  • Dorvinia: See Borca.
  • Falkovnia: Vlad Drakov with his habit of casually staking prisoners and criminals and listening to their screams is already so Horrorpunk that he hardly needs alterations.
  • Forlorn: That domain as a whole has always been smothered and overshadowed by the boxed set. Outside the castle there was never much excitement to be found. There could either be Wicker Man like settlements unregulated by the lord, or it might receive the axe completely.
  • G'Henna: G'Henna never made much sense as a core domain connected to Falkovnia and other bread baskets, and even as its own isolated place a state religion made from the Darklord's literal invisible friend always struck me as too silly even for a Horrorpunk take. I might either end up deleting it outright, or make it an island nexus point between Ravenloft and trashy Mad Max post-apocalypse full of two-headed mutant gangs, sorta the stand-in for Kaladnay.
  • Gundarak: Gundarak always seemed more like a poor man's Barovia with a poor man's Captain Ersatz for Strahd at the helm. Rather than to make it a poor man's substitute for Barovia, it might be more worthwhile as an alternate Barovia that explores the other angles of the pop-cultural Dracula that don't make sense in Barovia as described in I6, like The Satanic Rites of Dracula or Dracula beißt in Oberbayern.
  • Hazlan: Hazlan is basically the Ottomanic Empire if it had been based on magocracy instead of islam. I'd keep it a magocracy, but base it more on (back then) contemporary horror films about magicians like The Raven (the Vincent Price version) or The Devil Rides Out. Some seasoning with Doctor Strange also won't hurt, especially his nemesis Baron Karl Amadeus Mordo.
  • Invidia: Gothic Fantasy Spain. Not much else too add. The rock landscapes in the early part of Conan the Barbarian (especially the witch scene) were shot in Spain, so this could take some Sword & Sorcery elements in the countryside.
  • Kartakass: Kartakass is fine as is. It might need more of a Brothers Grimm / Black Forest vibe, but that is already there between the lines at least as I read it. The contemporary Sorcery! series from Fighting Fantasy could also provide inspiration.
  • Keening: The auto-kill quality of the Banshee darklord has always been B.S. that made the domain nearly unuseable as written. This would rather be the containment domain for the infectious Romero zombies, especially looking at Dawn of the Dead with the undead repeating their mall shopping routine they were used to when alive. And, given that it is the same time frame as Day of the Dead came out, there might be room for an underground resistance... - Alternatively, it could be something like Necropolis of 3.5 Libris Mortis, with a population of Necropolitans willingly turned into the undead. Or both?
  • Lamordia: Lamordia is fine as is. Might use more Krampus, but that is a minor point.
  • Markovia: As an Island of Doctor Moreau stand-in, it fits perfectly. Would work better as an island as in later iterations of Ravenloft.
  • Mordent: Also fine as is.
  • Nightmare Lands: The open-ended, surreal eastern border of the campaign setting doesn't need much change. If anything, I would put Arkandale and Verbrek closer to it to establish a relation of the Abber nomads to their savage natives. Could also use elements of the CoC Dreamlands box, which came out in 1986 (close enough for me).
  • Nova Vaasa: Fantasy Gothic Russia fuelled by Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Actually pretty thin for what large amount of land it fills out. I might salvage it with Rasputin and other Gothic Russian stuff, or leave it out entirely.
  • Richemulot: We might see more Mole People and Morlocks than wererats. Or, in gonzo Horrorpunk tradition, lycanthropic wererat-infected Mole People directing atomic Giant Rats!
  • Sithicus: Crumbling, degenerate elven realm headed by the definitive example of the Death Knight. Not sure if anything more needs to be done.
  • Tepest: Basically what would happen if you souped up The Wicker Man to be its own domain. Pretty sure that this is enough for Horrorpunk Ravenloft too.
  • Valachan: The only domain with black people, headed by one of the darklords with the most bizarre and confused background stories ever. I would probably separate it by water/mists from the Core as real world black Africa, and make its leader just a werepanther or pantherwere without the overdone vampirism aspect. Could also use some voodoo.
  • Verbrek: See Arkandale.
Aaand the Black Box islands:
  • Farelle: Honestly I could never make much of this domain during its mercifully short life. The darklord is boring and uninspiring, the domain is boring and uninspiring, and jackalweres as monsters are among the most boring and uninspiring. It might be best to give it the axe before it can even take off.
  • Har'Akir: Looking at all the Mummy films from Universal and Hammer, Har'Akir as a bronze age domain never made sense. Egypt always featured in old Horror films, but it was always a colonial Egypt millennia past its cultural pinnacle and saturated with advances collected from Europe. I would advance it to a more modern cultural level, re-attach it to the core and separate it by water, possibly attached to demoted Valachan. The real horror only begins once you start to open forbidden tombs or bring forbidden relics to Europe anyway.
  • Sanguinia: This one sits in the same place as Gundarak as a weird 2nd class Barovia - only that the citizenry especially embraces life as long as it lasts. Where Gundarak embraces all the pop-cultural Draculas not supported by Barovia, Sanguinia is Weimar as of F.W. Murnaus Nosferatu, with a plague-ridden populace celebrating their short lifes.
  • Souragne: This is Horror Haiti/Louisina as seen in White Zombie, The Serpent and the Rainbow, Hammer's Plague of the Zombies and so on. Easy to implement in Horrorpunk Ravenloft.
  • Sri Raj: Gothic Horror India. Short of Hammer's The Stranglers of Bombay, I am clueless, but this one film might be enough.
  • Staunton Bluffs: Like Forlorn, it is boring outside of the titular haunted castle. Difference is only that as an island it might receive the axe more easily without any player noticing.
  • Vechor: This is a very random domain probably best compared to Alice in Wonderland. Might work better as a throw-away line than as a fleshed out domain.
  • Zherisia: As an island metropolis without any hinterlands to feed its hungry mouths, Zherisia honestly made never much sense to me. It might either become a nominal capital of Dementlieu/Mordent/Richemulot with an Aliens underground within the core, or I might axe it completely.
Nun gut, es sei dir überlassen!
Zieh diesen Geist von seinem Urquell ab
Und führ ihn, kannst du ihn erfassen
Auf deinem Wege mit herab.
- Faust I
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