Glimmer's Rim
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It was meant to be an quick jaunt.
A week's worth of seafaring labor lay between you and a much-needed payday. On the third night¸ a sudden squall pummeled the ship like a mouse in Her paws. The crew scattered to drown in dark waters. Not you¸ though.
Some Thing found you. You were seized by a writhing¸ barnacled limb and swallowed past wiry baleen. Nestled¸ for a time¸ in a diaphanous bladder. You felt the dive¸ the pressure. Your gelatinous prison scrape-slipped through a gap in the sea floor and a jut of volcanic stone cracked too-hard against your head.
Then there was darkness. Then there was here.
Welcome to Glimmer's Rim.
Glimmer's Rim is a systemless psychedelic island hexcrawl designed as a stopgap adventure to use when your players hop onto a ship and sail off toward an unfinished corner of your map.
It's a gonzo treasure-trove island at the bottom of the sea¸ with 27 distinct hexes and a short dungeon to explore. The players will find themselves the newly acquired pets of the Salt Mother¸ who is the sea. In search of a way home they will encounter ancient truths¸ unholy horrors and enough priceless artifacts that their escape will surely not go unnoticed by the god that they are robbing.
The Rim is divided into four distinct areas:
The Rim Dunes--A shining¸ technicolor crescent of beach¸ lapped by the wine-dark waters of the bay. Each scoop of sand holds coin and gem¸ painted china¸ chiseled marbled¸ hammered bronze. Statues poke scatter-shod in basalt mazes and pastel swirls of coral creep up the beach to breath salt air. A giant rusted cage sits half-buried at the treeline where civilized castaways cower¸ marooned.
The Bayou Vesper--Where roots soak black in stagnant silt¸ their rotten husks adorned in purple flowers. The scent of ripe persimmon steeps heavy in hot air. Sick-sweet spice glints in the still water¸ eddying itself in secret patterns. Even skin contact is enough to loose your mind of the fetters of sanity. This is the realm of Dame Malfaisainte¸ The Exalted Maw¸ and the whole swamp is held in a phantasm of her creation. Even the trees sway and the earth itself hums to her tune.
The Tangle--The gnarled tail of a world-splitting tree reaches out its seed-encrusted roots like twisting¸ bony fingers up into the eternal dusk. The pitiless thicket knots its branches ever tighter unto its center; where a core of bent bark spits loose a mountainous alien limb of fossil stone. The crook of an arm? A bent knee? Perhaps it is high conceit to presume a form familiar to the children of men.
Mother's Embrace--A cramped dungeon inside the Salt Mother's petrified bones. At it's center lies the very core of the Rim¸ and the Salt Mother herself--The Heart of The Sea. The shell-corpse is home to a cult set upon the re-corporialization of their god. This would be bad for everybody¸ themselves most of all. The Salt Mother shed her skin long ago. She does not want it back.
On top of all that¸ Glimmer's Rim squeezes in a handful of quirky NPCs¸ 30-odd foes of alien and uncanny nature¸ tables for evocative treasure and useful tools¸ battlemaps¸ BGM¸ and more than one apocalypse clock ticking quickly down to midnight!
It's an adventure of transient nature by the very nature of its origins¸ but nothing about the Rim is meant to be forgot once you're done with it. It stays with you--sometimes as a gleaming prize¸ other times as a missing limb. On the island where the ocean hides Her heart¸ good and ill are found in equal measure. How will you strike your balance?
It was meant to be an quick jaunt.
A week's worth of seafaring labor lay between you and a much-needed payday. On the third night¸ a sudden squall pummeled the ship like a mouse in Her paws. The crew scattered to drown in dark waters. Not you¸ though.
Some Thing found you. You were seized by a writhing¸ barnacled limb and swallowed past wiry baleen. Nestled¸ for a time¸ in a diaphanous bladder. You felt the dive¸ the pressure. Your gelatinous prison scrape-slipped through a gap in the sea floor and a jut of volcanic stone cracked too-hard against your head.
Then there was darkness. Then there was here.
Welcome to Glimmer's Rim.
Glimmer's Rim is a systemless psychedelic island hexcrawl designed as a stopgap adventure to use when your players hop onto a ship and sail off toward an unfinished corner of your map.
It's a gonzo treasure-trove island at the bottom of the sea¸ with 27 distinct hexes and a short dungeon to explore. The players will find themselves the newly acquired pets of the Salt Mother¸ who is the sea. In search of a way home they will encounter ancient truths¸ unholy horrors and enough priceless artifacts that their escape will surely not go unnoticed by the god that they are robbing.
The Rim is divided into four distinct areas:
The Rim Dunes-- A shining¸ technicolor crescent of beach¸ lapped by the wine-dark waters of the bay. Each scoop of sand holds coin and gem¸ painted china¸ chiseled marbled¸ hammered bronze. Statues poke scatter-shod in basalt mazes and pastel swirls of coral creep up the beach to breath salt air. A giant rusted cage sits half-buried at the treeline where civilized castaways cower¸ marooned.
The Bayou Vesper-- Where roots soak black in stagnant silt¸ their rotten husks adorned in purple flowers. The scent of ripe persimmon steeps heavy in hot air. Sick-sweet spice glints in the still water¸ eddying itself in secret patterns. Even skin contact is enough to loose your mind of the fetters of sanity. This is the realm of Dame Malfaisainte¸ The Exalted Maw¸ and the whole swamp is held in a phantasm of her creation. Even the trees sway and the earth itself hums to her tune.
The Tangle-- The gnarled tail of a world-splitting tree reaches out its seed-encrusted roots like twisting¸ bony fingers up into the eternal dusk. The pitiless thicket knots its branches ever tighter unto its center; where a core of bent bark spits loose a mountainous alien limb of fossil stone. The crook of an arm? A bent knee? Perhaps it is high conceit to presume a form familiar to the children of men.
Mother's Embrace- - A cramped dungeon inside the Salt Mother's petrified bones. At it's center lies the very core of the Rim¸ and the Salt Mother herself--The Heart of The Sea. The shell-corpse is home to a cult set upon the re-corporialization of their god. This would be bad for everybody¸ themselves most of all. The Salt Mother shed her skin long ago. She does not want it back.
On top of all that¸ Glimmer's Rim squeezes in a handful of quirky NPCs¸ 30-odd foes of alien and uncanny nature¸ tables for evocative treasure and useful tools¸ battlemaps¸ BGM¸ and more than one apocalypse clock ticking quickly down to midnight!
It's an adventure of transient nature by the very nature of its origins¸ but nothing about the Rim is meant to be forgot once you're done with it. It stays with you--sometimes as a gleaming prize¸ other times as a missing limb. On the island where the ocean hides Her heart¸ good and ill are found in equal measure. How will you strike your balance?