Miria and Edryk face a terrifying trap and life-altering choices push on to the deepest chambers of the Fane of the All-Knowing.

In this episode Miria and Edryk narrowly escape a trap that borrows its inspiration from the AD&D2e spell Maximillian’s Stony Grasp, and the D&D3e spell Stone Fist that evolved from it. I discuss spells – and getting them wrong in the episode.

Warning: Spoilers ahead

Miria and Edryk encounter the being known as the All-Knowing, which is an extradimensional intelligence.

The voice of the All-knowing is provided by Jon Cohen of Tale of the Manticore, one of the first Solo Semi-Actual-Play podcasts, and one of the biggest inspirations for Swords Against Madness. You can hear Tale of the Manticore wherever you get your pdcasts, and check out his official website here. And hear the trailer for Tale of the Manticore here:

The All-Knowing is a projection of an intelligence from a higher quantum state that has spent aeons trying to understand three-dimensional beings that can move only one way through time. It has spent centuries the prisoner of the Trassi.

Correspond: The All-Knowing can possess a living being that is capable of casting Magic-User Spells, An unwilling being may make two saving throws, if they succeed one, they take 2d10 damage but repel the All-knowing (the head explodes if this damage kills them.) If they succeed both they repel the All-Knowing and take no damage.

A being that is possessed by the All-knowing may communicate with it telepathically. If it tries to direct their actions, they may make a save to resist. While possessed by the All-knowing they may use its Chaos Ray attack, regenerate 1 hp per round, and are immune to and cured of all diseases and poison, thanks to the All-Knowing’s ability to manipulate their body. Neither they nor the All-Knowing may use its Time Warp abilities during this time.

If the All-Knowing’s vessel is killed it is immediately forced to take its physical form and takes damage from its Reality Vulnerability.

Time Warp: The All-Knowing can cast Slow, and Haste at will. It can cast Time Stop, Divination, and Stasis each once per day.

Reality Vulnerability: The All-Knowing takes damage when exposed to the Prime Material Plane or a Plane of strong Law. it suffers 4d4 damage each round it is in such a plane unless it is surrounded by a field of magical chaos of some kind or has possessed a creature that can cast magic-user spells.

While Miria & Edryk face a deadly trap, The Master & his acolyte Halu conspire to murder Miria, and Yanghu extracts a bloody revenge on the crew of the pirate ship Xur.

This epsiode uses a ship layout diagram from Cepheus Deluxe as its dungeon map, but is played entirely with Swords 7 Wizardry. It focuses primarily on the activity of the campaign’s villains. It includes several encounters with human bandits, soldiers, and sergeants at arms as described in Swords & Wizardry.

Yanghu is a very old and powerful Ogre Mage who has been a captain in the Trassi smuggling and irate fleet for centuries. 400 years ago, he discovered a crashed Gorum prison ship on Orbos, and turned it into a thriving business in living weapons. Selling the Gorum as weapons is so heinous that even the rest of the Trassi Syndicate might rebuke him if they knew… which is why he wants to make sure Miria is silenced. The destruction of his Corsair-class starship, the Ko-Dan has put him in a position where he needs to capture a new ship and a new crew.

Like all Ogre Magi, Yanghu can cast a fly spell and invisibility at will. He can also cast the following spells one per day: darkness 15ft. radius, charm person, polymorph self (into humanoid forms from 5-12′ tall), and cone of cold (8d6 damage, save for half)

Yanghu regains 1 hit point per round unless he is harmed by fire (including lasers) or acid.

Note: Due to an error, this entry originally pointed to episode 14. This has been fixed and the correct episode should now play.

In the aftermath of the battle in orbit over Orbos, space pirate comb the hulk of the Ko-Dan for treasure. Miria and Edryk push deeper into the Fane of the All-Knowing, and Miria reminisces about her past.

This episode continues to use material from Cepheus Deluxe, a modern remake of the 1977 Scifi RPG Traveller, along with Swords & Wizardry to create a classic, 1977 D&D experience.

This session used space travel mechanics from Cepheus Deluxe: Enhanced Edition, a retro-clone of Classic Traveller.

As Miria, Edryk, and Nala press deeper into the trap-laden Fane of the All-Knowing, the Ogre-Mage crime-lord Yanghu deals with a vicious sneak attack on his starship.

This adventure mixes classic RPGs, using Swords & Wizardry to simulate D&D as it was played in 1977, along with scenes from Cepheus Deluxe, a modern re-imagining of the 1977 version of the classic Sci-Fi TTRPG Traveller.

Fair warning: This episode includes some mild profanity that, while within the limits of the 1980s PG limit, is worth mentioning.

In this episode I handled outer space conflict using the game Cepeheus Deluxe: Enhanced Edition, by Stellagamma Games, which is a slightly modernized clone of the original 1977 rules to the Science Fiction TTRPG Traveller.

Miria, Rayya, Nala, and Edryk search for their lost companion and the mysterious all knowing in a dungeon full of strange traps, mechanical constructs and deadly illusions. In space, a conflict mounts between the Trassi syndicate and a treacherous business partner.

This episode includes logic puzzles, deadly traps, and a custom monster featured in the show notes. It also has the terrible lethality of Old D&D on full display.

In this episode the party faces a deadly magical foe called the Arcane Guardian.

The crowning achievement of the Order of Stars, this entity of ceramic and crystal is awakened by those who tinker with the machines in the Fane of the All-Knowing without knowing the correct passkey. It uses its powers to create a disorienting Mirage Arcana which hides the numerous traps that it can activate about its lair. It then may cast Push or Pull each round to force its foes into unseen traps.

Miria, Rayya, Nala, Garland, and Edryk enter the Fane of the All-Knowing: a labyrinth of traps, illusions, and deadly guardians. Nothing in their path is what they seem. Especially when the traps force the group apart.

This episode discusses solo gaming tools that I use at length, and includes the classic D&D monster, the Piercer, lightly reskinned to fit the dungeon theme.

I created this dungeon using the AD&D Random Dungeon Generator from Donjon.bin.sh; which creates a complete dungeon based on your specifications and to a theme.

Another powerful tool for solo map generation is the game Four Against Darkness; a lightweight solo dungeon crawler that makes exceptional maps. Read my review of it here.

A faster, and extremely light solo adventure tool that I have also used for solo adventuring is Tale of the Manticore’s very own One Shot in the Dark, that combines solo card game and old-school dungeon crawl. Read my review of it here. Great game, and my favourite podcast!

I also occasionally use a random d20 or d66 encounter table of monsters, traps, and encounters based on a Dungeon theme, connected to a clock system similar to that used in Fabula Ultima or Blades in the Dark. you can see one of my earliest versions of that method in my three-part review of Salamandur Household for Pacts & Blades: part one, part two, part three.

Miria meets one new ally and sets out to fulfill the Prophecy and wake the All-Knowing, taking to flight in her newly acquired spaceship with a team of new allies.

A new dungeon crawl begins in this episode!

This episode features a classic low-level D&D monster, and shows off an equally classic magic item!

Miria gathers new allies, and tries to buy time as the radiation begins to consume her. Rayya and Miria draw up plans for war. Two new allies join the party, each separately seeking ways to do penance.

This episode includes some much-needed downtime where Miria recruits some new party members and seeks medical attention for her radiation poisoning. It includes some detailed notes on how I use the Mythic Game Master Emulator.

Undeadwood Weird West RPG: Dead Man’s Dice Preview Version is my complete and fully playable Western fantasy TTRPG. This version does not have the GM Toolkit, the advanced magic rules, or the complete Wonkatonkwa County Gazetteer, but it is everything you need for pulpy and gothic cowboy adventures.

Heroes and Homelands is an OSR retro-game that features simplified magic, an advantage/disadvantage system, and expanded wilderness adventuring rules that make it a smooth-fast playing experience.

More importantly it is designed as a rules-hacking toolkit! Every section is optimized for easy cut & paste and editing. Making it a perfect base for writing your own customized game.

A summary of the first 10 episodes of Swords Against Madness.

Miria, a space-faring smuggler crash-lands on the world of Orbus, near the Island of Nar. Nar is a poor former colony of a failed Oligarchy full of conflict between its two religions, and is plagued by seeming indestructible monsters.

Miria steps right into the conflict by giving them the holy words she guessed had been engineered into the Island’s older faith by star-faring criminals, and thanks to horrible radiation poisoning, finds herself racing against time to fulfill a prophecy, hunt down an old space pirate associate, end the clash between faiths, and slay monsters, with the help of a pair of teen-aged misfits.

But her disruption to the culture of the Island paints a target on her back, and she is kidnapped by a sorcerer-assassin called Mormont, who attempts to sell her to Yanghu, the space pirate who shot Miria down. This leads to a terrifying clash between Mormont, the party, a vicious miser with a grudge Kalmek, a hit squad of Space Pirates, immortal space barbarians accidentally freed from cry-stasis, and combat robots.

Miria and her teen-aged friend Rayya manage to barely escape with their life, stealing a spaceshipin the process,

Miria, Olan, & Rayya make a desperate ploy not just to escape Yanghu’s showroom, but to escape in style… but the Gorum are still hunting, and the lizard-man starfighter pilot Sshosk is still between them and freedom.

This episode features transcripts thanks to the openVINO tool kit for Audacity!

I have created a set of simple science fiction weapons that the Trassi Syndicate use based on the material in the various Sci-Fi games I have used to inspire the game’s Sci-Fi rules. The prices represent the fact that the materials used to create this equipment cannot be bought on Obros.

Electro-Lasers: draw ambient electricity from the environment. They can be fired once per round only. On a damage roll of 1 they require a round to recharge before the next attack.

Heavy Pulse Lasers: are heavy, bulky weapons that emits rapid-fire streams of laser fire, and can either grant the wielder a +2 to hit or make an attack against all enemies in a 30ft. cone. The ammunition is a backpack battery.

Laser Assault Rifle: An assault rifle can use up 12 rounds to deal 4d8 damage in a fully automatic burst and gain a +2 to hit this uses up all attacks in the round.

Shotguns: are at +2 to attack a single target. It can be used to attack up to 3 targets at once as long as they are within 5ft of each other.

Nanoweave: does not require a proficiency in armor to wear, and does not interfere with magic.

Composite Armors: All count as light armor, any class proficient in leather armor can wear Light or medium composite armor, andy calss capable of wearing chainmail may wear heavy composite armor.