Roleplayer #15, August 1989
Cavemen and Conquistadors
Campaign Suggestions for Ice Age
by Kirk Tate
The most frequent comment I've heard about GURPS
Ice Age has
been something along the lines of "Hmmm, but what would you do with
it?" As the book's author, I spent a substantial amount of time pondering
that very question -- just what kind of adventures and campaigns would a
GM build around a group of hairy, stone-age tribesmen? Most of my answers
found their way into the Campaigning chapter, but a few of the
crazier ones did not survive editing. Others didn't occur to me until after
the final draft had gone to the printers. Here are three of my favorites:
Thundering Hooves
There are several tantalizing pieces of evidence that Cro-Magnon Man had
domesticated animals thousands of years earlier than is generally believed.
At two sites in France, engravings of horses -- estimated to be 15,000 years
old -- have been found with what appear to be rope harnesses carved into
them. At another cave, a harnessed reindeer is depicted. Even more interesting
are the fossilized teeth of two horses that lived in northern France about
30,000 years ago. These teeth show a distinctive pattern of wear, called
"crib-biting," normally seen only in domesticated horses.
Although this scant evidence is not enough to convince anthropologists that
Cro-Magnon Man had domesticated the horse, it conjures up some curious images.
Imagine our fur-clad heroes wandering the tundra, with food, clothing, shelter,
even children packed neatly on horse-drawn sledges, rather than toiling
along with their meager belongings on their backs. Better yet, picture them
descending upon their enemies at full gallop, each hunter mounted on his
trusty steed -- or their enemy descending upon them.
The domesticated horse could be to the Cro-Magnon man what fire was to Homo
erectus. An entire campaign could revolve around the capture, taming
and training of horses. In a Warring Tribes campaign, the horse might be
just the edge the Good Guys need to defeat the Bad Guys. Remember, Ice Age
horsemen won't have saddles, stirrups or bridles with bits; at best, the
mount would be controlled by a rope looped around the animal's nose and
held in one hand (-3 to Riding skill). Also, these horses aren't trained,
specially bred destriers; they're more like timid brown zebras. Our heroes
will fall off -- a lot.
Texas, 1540
In the year 1540, Francisco Vasquez Coronado set out from what would one
day be called Mexico City to search for the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola.
Stories brought back by the explorer Cabeza de Vaca told of streets paved
with gold and beautiful women adorned in magnificent jewelry. Coronado never
found the legendary cities, but he was the first European to encounter the
primitive Indian tribes of the southern Great Plains.
These tribes, probably the Apache, Comanche, Wichita and Kansa, were at
Tech Level 0 -- the stone age. They had no knowledge of metals, firearms
or the wheel. They had never even seen a horse -- horses were not at that
time native to the Americas. In fact, when they first saw the mounted Spaniards,
they thought that rider and horse were a single creature, the upper part
being armored like the armadillo. They were completely shocked when the
creature split itself in two, and the upper half walked up to them on two
legs and started talking.
A campaign in which
Indian PCs encounter the Spaniards could be challenging. The players
would have to roleplay their amazement at the European technology, as well
as their inability to understand it. Having seen how easily the mounted
foreigners move about, it will occur to them that they could use some horses
themselves, but the Spaniards will be most unwilling to part with their
mounts. A raid to steal horses might be staged, but then the tribesmen will
have to learn to ride. . .
Religion will play an important role. The Indians practiced an advanced
form of totemism, and the Spanish priests will be anxious to convert them
to Christianity. Not only do individual tribes, clans and families have
totems, but the tribesmen worship several major nature spirits. The Buffalo,
Coyote, Eagle and Raven are important, and the Great Spirit is above them
all. The Indians will find it almost impossible to understand the abstract
concepts of Christianity, removed as it is from the world of nature.
Sources for adventure ideas include the Western novels of Don Coldsmith,
beginning with The Trail of the Spanish Bit. These novels -- there
are ten of them -- are all told from the Indian point of view, and set in
the Great Plains during the 16th century. For source material on the Spanish
in America during this period, check out GURPS
Swashbucklers.
Monsters of the Mist
This was inspired by the book Eaters of the Dead, the
travel account of Ibn Fadlan, an Arab ambassador who visited Scandinavia
in the year 922 A.D., translated and edited by Michael Crichton. It describes
a series of battles between Vikings
and the wendol -- short, stocky, hairy brutes with sloping brows
and incredible strength. These "monsters" attack on dark, mist-shrouded
nights, and carry off humans to eat them. When the Vikings attack their
lair, they find, among other things, piles of stone flakes used for skinning
and figurines of pregnant females. Fadlan's description of the creatures
and the figurines lead Crichton to speculate that the wendol may have been
a tribe of Neanderthals that survived in the mountains of Scandinavia as
recently as a thousand years ago.
This could provide a way to bring a conventional fantasy campaign and an
Ice Age campaign together. The Neanderthals might prey on the strange men
with the metal swords and wooden caves, or they might be prey themselves.
The tribe could be engaged in a grim fight for survival, being driven ever
farther into the cold mountains by the frightening metal-skinned giants.
As it becomes more and more difficult to get food, they conduct more shamanistic
ceremonies, but the magic no longer works (perhaps the shamanism of the
more numerous Vikings overpowers their magic). Eventually, they are forced
to prey upon the flocks of the Northmen, and perhaps the men themselves.
An enterprising GM might even run two separate parties, one of Neanderthals,
the other of Viking warriors. (They don't have to be Vikings, of course
-- the setting could be any isolated, cool environment.) The players of
the two groups, meeting on different days, could be kept in the dark about
the fact that they are really fighting each other. Then, at the climactic
battle, a player might find his enemy being played by his best friend on
the other side of the table! The results, while bloody, could be interesting.
Who knows . . . the final result might be a party made up of both races.
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