#october

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 7, 2016
3 min

20 Things to Find in a Witch's Lair

This is the second of my October posts for 2016. Today, we are going to explore another spooky location; this time we'll be discussing the lairs of witches. The first question that you must answer when designing a witch's lair is, of course, which witch? In other words, what kind of witch is this lair for. Numerous elements must be considered about the NPC before the lair can be planned. This is NOT a one-size fits all kind of situation. Here are some of the questions the GM

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20 Things to Find Inside an Ancient Barrow

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 4, 2016
5 min

20 Things to Find Inside an Ancient Barrow

Today's post is the first of my October-themed posts for this year. In this article we will delve into a barrow or kurgan, in other words a burial place or tomb, to see what one might find there. Before jumping straight to the list of things, let's first take some time to analyze the structure of the barrow, as well as the types of creatures one might find inside. Barrows, (also called tumuli, burial mounds, and kurgans), are mounds of earth and stone raised over one or more

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20 Spell Components Found in the Daerkwood

Mark S. Cookman

Sep 29, 2016
5 min

20 Spell Components Found in the Daerkwood

Today's post is a transition from the orc series into some more Halloween-themed posts. Given the orc clans and other terrible monsters that live there, why does anyone ever venture into the Daerkwood? This same question can be applied to any dark and spooky place. There are numerous secrets hidden within the Daerkwood to attract adventurers, but the most-common reason people go there is for the components used in powerful magics. The Daerkwood is an ancient forest steeped in

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Mark S. Cookman

Sep 23, 2016
6 min

What Makes Good Orcs Go Bad?

This is the 14th post in the orc series and probably the last for a while. I promise you that we have not seen the last of the orcs, however the release of Orcs of the Moon Skull Clan is being delayed for a re-work involving more material and some custom art. Look for the orcs to finally come out around the holiday season. The art today comes from Publisher's Choice Quality Stock Art (c) Rick Hershey / Fat Goblin Games. Rick is one of the artists that I hope to get some piece

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A Witch-y Double Feature: Ingredients and Curses

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 29, 2015
5 min

A Witch-y Double Feature: Ingredients and Curses

Another double-feature set for your halloween-themed games. Staying with the theme of witches, allow me to present for your enjoyment 20 Eerie Components for Witches Spells and 20 Dark Rites of the Coven. Witches always seem to be the most trouble either when they are brewing up evil in their cauldrons or when they gather together in numbers to perform dark rituals. This double-feature allows you to prepare for both. Witches can cast spells, make minor hexes, brew potions, an

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Gobbits - The Special Servants of Witches in October

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 23, 2015
3 min

Gobbits - The Special Servants of Witches in October

Halloween is a time for children and the young at heart to explore what frightens them. Keeping with this central core of Halloween is today's post. The idea behind the Gobbits is to create a small monster that is more disgusting than dangerous and more funny than horrible to help introduce younger players to the game. This is not to say that Gobbits are for novices only; a devious GM could easily wreak havoc with a few of them, even against experienced players. Without furth

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Mark S. Cookman

Oct 22, 2015
3 min

20 Tools of the Prepared Witch Hunter

Witches are a problem no matter what time of year it is, but they always seem to get thicker in number as Halloween grows closer. Today's post explores what tools the prepared witch hunter keeps close at hand in order to triumph over all of the various forces of darkness that the great adversary unleashes upon the righteous. Whether the items listed below are advice from an experienced hunter to novice one, seeds for artifacts to be located by your PC's, or just something one

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20 Ways to Scare with Skulls and Skeletons

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 21, 2015
3 min

20 Ways to Scare with Skulls and Skeletons

Here's more halloween fun for you RPG GM's, this time in the form of skulls and skeletons. Here are 20 different ways that you can use skulls and/or skeletons to scare your players -- or at least dress up your adventure a bit, even if you don't scare them. Be warned that some might find this list to be graphic because it deals with parts of dead people. Knowing that you have been duly warned that horrifying elements could await you, I humbly present one of my smaller closets.

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Mark S. Cookman

Oct 20, 2015
3 min

20 Ghosts to Haunt Your Castle

In my quest to make certain that you have as many items as possible to help you create a better Halloween adventure for yourself and your players, I considered that you might need some ghosts to haunt your castle, manor house, sage's mansion, and/or haunted house. Here are 20 spooky encounters with spirits to dress up your haunt. Most of these are just servants or side-line spooks for whatever your main event is, but hopefully they will give you a good idea or two. As always,

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Mark S. Cookman

Oct 17, 2015
4 min

A Library for Your Haunted Castle

We're here again to discuss more scary things to use for your own horror games in whatever setting they might be in. The usual number of items for these posts is 20, but because I have been so lax in posting lately I thought you deserved more, so I decided to give you a library of spooky tomes. If you mix and match the elements below, you will be able to create a wall full of interesting books to be found in a spooky old manor, alchemist's lab, or wizard's tower in nearly no

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Mark S. Cookman

Oct 8, 2015
3 min

20 Grisly Scenes of Murder

Sometimes an excellent horror story must start with (or will enventually involve) a horrifying crime scene. Below are 20 scenes of murder most foul for you to use in your rpg's or horror stories. Be warned that these descriptions are NOT meant for minors and might be upsetting to you. Now that you have been duly warned, here are 20 Grisly Scenes of Murder. Enjoy! Something took a very large bite out of this streetwalker. Large as in half of her chest is gone. All that remains

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20 Different Types of Ghosts to Tell Stories About

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 6, 2015
5 min

20 Different Types of Ghosts to Tell Stories About

What would October be without ghost stories? I don't even want to know. I grew up on ghost stories and I love them. Don't get me wrong though, I don't want to talk about religion or life after death. I certainly don't want to get into any kind of scientific/religious/philosophical debate about whether or not ghosts really exist. I just want to talk about ghosts like those that appear in ghost stories or rpg's. Researchers of paranormal phenomena (again, remember that we are h

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An October Double-Feature: 20 Haunted House Dressings & 13 Devils for Dancing

Mark S. Cookman

Oct 5, 2015
7 min

An October Double-Feature: 20 Haunted House Dressings & 13 Devils for Dancing

I love october. I love fall, halloween, and scary movies. Today, you get a double-feature. Two tables instead of just one. The first is a collection of haunted furnishings for a haunted house. The second is a list of 13 Devils, with a short description about each one, that you might find useful for your horror games, if you do that sort of thing. If not, then hopefully you will just enjoy the read. Haunted houses are creepy because bizarre things happen inside them. In any go

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Mark S. Cookman

Oct 2, 2015
3 min

20 Things in the Lair of the Mummy King

For the past few blog posts we have been exploring the desert, but as that old song says "all good things must come to an end" and so it must be with our exploration of the desert. With the beginning of October upon us, we will move our focus to monsters and their lairs. The mysterious Mummy King, rumored to entombed in the deep desert, and his lair seems the perfect way both to close out the desert tables and to bring in the monster tables. The caravan master doesn't know w

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