Analysis: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

Potential spoiler warning for a fifty plus year-old novella...

Recently I finished my first read-through of the classic sci-fi novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Phillip K. Dick. It is best known for being the inspiration for the Blade Runner films. In a funny coincidence, a good friend recommended the book about six months ago to me, and that same week I ran The Big Hoodoo in Trail of Cthulhu as a one-shot, which features Phil Dick and other famous sci-fi authors in the adventure (unfortunately I enjoyed that adventure less than this book). There will be mild spoilers for the novel.

A few thoughts struck me about the book:

• Dick’s prose is beautiful, particularly in the description of transcendence and the emotional landscapes he paints, such as chapter two’s description of the empathy box collective experience.
• The mood dialer devices are an analogue for the measures we take to drown out our emotions. 
• The fear of the silence from Isidore. We are surrounded by a cacophony of voices and an unending onslaught of events. Even in our private moments we seek to escape the silence by escaping through a screen, or an endless Spotify track.
• A focus on the emotional and empathetic responses of humans, and perhaps the core argument that apathy and inability to empathize is a symptom of psychological problems. Perhaps even more, acts of violence are, like in our normal social relationship, considered highly taboo. Yet our media, stories, and games often have a significant focus on violence in one form or another.

The novel remains important due to its core question: What does it truly mean to be human? In the age of AI, even with its still limited large language model applications, these questions are still relevant. Dick’s work remains resonant across the years, as it grapples with the same void of meaning that we feel in the modern world. The blurring between the real and the false in our society and discourse. The search for empathy, and the desire to connect to other living beings—the hollow promises of technology that we can attain such a level of meaning. And the truth that perhaps the essence of being human is both the abject void of loneliness juxtaposed by the brief ecstasies of complete connection with others across that void.

Latest EN5ider Release: Check Out My Two Articles!

I almost missed last week’s EN World post announcing the release of EN5ider Magazine Issue 11, which features not just one but two articles I penned. This issue was themed around “small folk,” often overlooked, but looming large in our literary tradition of fantasy from Tolkien on down.

Within amongst the other great contributions you’ll find my profile of Bella’s Bruisers and the mini-adventure Reaper of the Depths. I hope you take the time to check them out and the rest of the fantastic material you can pick up through EN Publishing’s EN5ider magazine’s ten year back catalogue!

Conan Reflection: The Scarlet Citadel

There will be spoilers for the short story in the article below…

When I first saw the title of this particular story, I thought of the eponymous adventure book by Kobold Press. As I read further, the influence at a broad level by this particular Howard story on the latter work became even more apparent. The tropes of a dungeon created by an evil wizard and populated with otherworldly monsters, the results of arcane experiments or communion with still greater evils. 

This direction is a bit unexpected, setting in the era of Conan as King of Aquilonia, rather than the thief, rogue, or sea wolf. It is out of the frying pan and into the fire as his army is betrayed and destroyed. The major focus of the story is on the descent to the underworld, in which the hero confronts the nightmarish horrors of the dark dungeon Tsotha, the wizard said to do demonic deals. Conan’s duel with the great serpent in the depths and rescue of a mage rival of Tsotha’s. The higher level politics are also fun details—one whole section details the activities of Conan’s loyal supporters in his kingdom’s capital and the efforts of a treacherous ally to seize the throne. 

All the elements described in the milieu of early roleplaying here are present—the ascendancy of the fighter, Conan, to political leadership. The adventure that brought the hero once more into the depths of a dungeon. These elements shine through in the early editions of the hobby and many of the aspirations of our modern games. The battles to be war gamed out, the adventures of the hero in the world shaped by these battles. Another intriguing touchstone in the mosaic of the tabletop roleplaying game hobby and its larger influence on society.

Advanced FASERIP/Superhero RPG Setting: New York, New York 2009

Photo is used under a CC0 license

In reading Advanced FASERIP, I began thinking about the type of setting that I would set such a game in. The game notes that many superhero settings focus on the present day—and we see that in both comics and now in modern superhero films. There’s also the fun idea of playing in a given period, like the story we see in the Captain America: The First Avenger film. So I thought a bit about a time and place that would be interesting, more recent than the 1940s or 1970s, which are both eras I think of when I think of comic book heroes. I don’t feel like playing in the modern day—maybe I’ll feel different in ten years when it’s just a memory.

I landed on an alternative history version of 2009. Why that year? It’s one I remember. The 2000s were an interesting time, and the wake of the Recession a time of transition, even if we didn’t know it at the time. The forces of globalization and the resulting economic shifts still play an important role in our real world timeline. It’s also an interesting era for technology, where the iPhone and smartphone technologies, along with social media and the global internet were still emerging. Plenty of people were just getting their first cell phone, the flip phone was getting slimmer and sleeker—the US president had a BlackBerry he refused to get rid of upon entering office. Phone cameras were still developing, with images of low enough quality that in this timeline you could still perhaps not believe evidence of superheroes. 

Why New York? Because it’s an easy, clique place to set a pulpy story about superheroes. There were a reported 19 million inhabitants that year. Lots of people and places to explore. Iconic backdrops to choose from. And of course, it’s easy to go on the road if you need to, whether across the US, or across the world.

The Thrill of Creation

There is a nerve-wracking, nail-biting, anxiety-fueled moment when you hit send on a pitch for an RPG product. Because then you wait for a few days—a week? To see if your ideas made the cut. If someone thought they were worth investing time and money into developing, creating some real visual art, and printing on the page. 

There’s also nothing so thrilling as seeing one of your articles commissioned. Sometimes which ones made it baffles you. Like that one that was written feverishly in ten minutes at five in the morning on the due date before going to work so the noon deadline doesn’t creep up on you—yeah, somehow that throwaway is now in print, while the others I spent weeks thinking about didn’t make the cut. 

It doesn’t need to make sense. Creativity means giving other people control once you’ve made something. They get to form their own opinions, cut it apart, critique it…or maybe enjoy it, be inspired. They get to decide. And you just get to be happy you got to make something.

Doctrine of Ghul - The Frozen Cyst Reimagined

Awhile back, I posted my thoughts regarding the adventure Doctrine of Ghul. That particular adventure uses an isometric map for the location of the Frozen Cyst. Since I was playing on a VTT with this particular group, I decided to redraw the map in a two-dimensional style for easier use and tactical positioning for us. It follows the descriptions provided in that adventure. Here is the result:

Goldentongue's Tomb

See below a simple map I created for my home Ptolus game, outlining a simple tomb. I created an original quest arc based on a story seed in the Ptolus sourcebook. The party needed to prevent religious inquisitors from dispelling the ghost of a kindly minstrel (the titular character of the Ghostly Minstrel tavern and inn, an iconic and central location in a Ptolus campaign).

They discovered that this particular tomb was the resting place of the spector's wife, who with her husband was tragically killed by fiend-worshiping cultists many years prior. The adventurers found evidence here of this story, which they used to successful defend the ghost in a religious court. Then they returned, following a group of cultists who kidnapped a friendly acolyte and planned to sacrifice him in a terrible ritual to summon Lord Karcius, the patron of the same group of cultists.