For Eric, post your suggestions for what happens if you don't "Keep on the Borderlands". For example, "Keep on the Borderlands or Cave into Chaos!"
Originally shared by Eric Norred
Remain on the Borderlands...
The first time I ever saw mention of B2 was in an ad in the back of the Endless Quest book "The Revenge of the Rainbow Dragons" and the ad omitted the first "The". Thus, being young and not knowing what a "keep" was, I imagined the title of the module was some sort of odd, foreboding warning....
I thought the same thing. Maybe like a song - "Keep on the borderlands, always on the borderlands, keep on the borderlands of life!"
ReplyDeleteI'd say it's the adventurers' creed.. Keep to the Borderlands - for the Realm is full of deceitful men, who trade honeyed words while binding freemen to serfdom with the fetters of their laws; while the Wilderness is beyond the pale of humankind, and those who stray too long there will one day end up as bleached bones being gnawed by wolves. Keep to the Borderlands, where you may be free and make your own way in the world!
ReplyDeleteKeep on the Borderlands 'cause that's where the crazy Yoda hermit guy lairs and he's teaching the phantasmal force to all them adventurer types! :P
ReplyDeleteWow Andy. That was rather beautiful.
ReplyDeleteKeep on the Borderlands because that is where the known and unknown still meet.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Chris Holmes!
ReplyDeleteYup. Same here. Keep on the Borderlands was just D&D's way of playing "King of the Hill". Beautiful, Andy! I so want to use that in my game now. ;)
ReplyDeleteEric Norred just in case you missed this
ReplyDeleteHa ha! Thanks for tagging me in this Zach H!
ReplyDeleteAndy C, that's awesome. What an inspirational post. I'm seriously considering copying/quoting you and putting that in my notes somewhere.
Andy's take makes a lot of sense in a Howardian way. That the wilds are overrun with evil and that said evil wears no other face than what it truly is. Meanwhile, 'modern' civilization is filled to tankard-top with bloody treachery and petty guile. Better to live in the in-between realm (a sort of 'wild west') where there may sometime be the worst of each but also the best of both to the benefit of any honest enough (in work, if not morals) and brave enough to carve out their own way.
ReplyDeleteEric Norred And there is the Leiberian response that tribal societies are in reality just as petty overwhelmed with tribal taboos and puppet warlords being controlled by scheming shamans.
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