A Place that was, is, and will be - Pink Pony of Death #1

Pink Pony of Death is a fanzine dedicated to OSR adventure gaming and horror roleplaying games. Issue #1 presents an adventure module for the Shadowdark RPG, drawing inspiration from classic sword & sorcery fiction and weird fantasy. This zine also includes setting material to portray the doomed city-state of Narbassal, where the adventure module unfolds.

If you are looking for dark sword and sorcery adventure with an ancient world vibe that echoes the works of Fritz Leiber, Karl-Edward Wagner, and Michael Moorcock, Pink Pony of Death #1 might be to your liking.

Within this 65-page zine, you will find:

• A Place that was, is, and will be: An urban-based timecrawl for level 1-3 characters. PCs will explore the dire fate of the city-state of Narbassal, its warring factions, political intrigue, Tha’umilian blood magic, time travel, and time-space paradoxes.

• Map of Narbassal: Explore eleven keyed locations, from King Vessalamchir’s Palace to the city’s formidable seawall.

• Description of Narbassal’s Ten Wards: Meet the deep divers of Fell Qur, or mingle with cult-initiates of the sea-goddess Balaushtu in the Ash-Vakar quarter. Get lost in Narbassal’s maze of alleys. 

• Random Tables for Urban Exploration: Generate neighborhoods and encounters as your players explore Narbassal before and after its destruction by the enemy fleet of the the city-state of Harbakaya.

• Eight Narbassalian Taverns: Each tavern is teeming with adventure seeds. Buy your friends some drinks and get to meet the wrong people.

• Timetable of Events: A schedule of past, current, and future events, ready to be messed up by your players.

• New Character Backgrounds: Create Shadowdark characters with setting-specific backgrounds such as dream interpreters, gladiators, and famed sword-singers.

• Foes, friends, and new monsters: Beware the messengers of the demon-goddess Lamachanti! Stats are provided for the Shadowdark rules set and 1e.  

• Narbassalian Cuisine: Essential information for someone visiting the city-state for the first time. 

• Four additional NPCs with Adventure Hooks, each of them providing opportunities for daring adventures in Narbassal.

• Alternative Cover: A homage to classic sword and sorcery novel bought in a thrift store.

• Original Artwork: Featuring art by real people. No AI “art” in this dojo.
  




WHAT IS THIS ABOUT?


 This module embarks a group of roguish PCs on an adventure in the labyrinthine city of Narbassal, 7 days before it is sacked by a warfleet hailing from the nearby city-state of Harbakaya.

 Enter, Miriel aka Lady Dragonfly, an acquaintance of the PCs and leader of a nascent thieves’ guild, the Dragonflies. During her covert trip into the sanctuary of the enfeebled Oloc, an alleged sorcerer dwelling in the ruins of a time worn Tha’umil warship, Miriel chanced upon a most profitable secret: Deep in the decaying vessel, she stumbled upon a portal, the chronolabe , that bridged the present (now) with a future version of Narbassal (then), wherein the city lies in ruin.


CHOICES


The PCs will discover this portal that grants them passage into a future iteration of the city-state of Narbassal in which the city has been ravaged by enemy forces. They have the option to align with Miriel’s strategy: pillaging whatever remnants of wealth endure within the desolate city and electing to remain in this future timeline. 

Conversely, they might aspire to journey back to present-day Narbassal (now) to forewarn its inhabitants about the looming catastrophe. Throughout playtesting this module, players came up with various ideas to engage with both the current and future version of Narbassal. 

However, each decision of the players can be complicated due to the possibility that utilizing the portal to return to the present may subject individual PCs to reality- altering conditions (transtemporal fracture syndrome). The duration spent in the future amplifies the challenge of returning unharmed, providing a push-your- luck mechanism.