Dark Lord: An Origin story. Or: Say, that's a nice Kingdom you got there....

  Many of you that have been following this Journal may have found yourself wondering just what fucking Class am I? What the shit is a Dark Lord? Why isn't it covered in the 13th Edition rules?


  Everyone, good and evil, falls into one Class or another. Eighty-some percent of those can be lumped into one of the following four Macro-Categories: Warrior, Magic User, Cleric, Thief.


  There are obviously nearly endless sub-classes of each of these specializations, and when a Hero or Scumbag gets serious in their levels, they can split Class and learn skills from multiple disciplines, thus becoming Multi-Class entities, like me.


  For those of you who may be curious, my current brand of the Dark Lord class can best be described as a Warrior/Assassin with some basic magical ability, a keen sense of character, a gift for unorthodox tactics and a fucking massive budget. In the big leagues I'm referred to as a Dungeon Mogul/Adventure Visionary with a Master Class Specialization in Death Park Management and a Minor in Mass Slaughter/Burnin Shit Down.






  I had the advantage of being handed down a very substantial and lucrative Empire by my Father*1 which had been established and handed down to him by my Grandmother, a Village Witch possessed of an astonishing sense of ambition coupled with an utter lack of morals or mercy.


  My father expanded this Empire in his own right, crushing a whole bunch of peoples under his boot heels, old school style. Lots of butchery, public torture-killings and random baby-throwing contests. He was from a different generation, my Dad. He didn't really see the big picture and how one insanely powerful but progressive thinking Dark Lord could link all the facets of the trade into one unified money making machine and virtually eliminate the need for genocide in the bargain.


  Unless one becomes suitably annoyed of course.


  When my Pops decided he was ready for me to murder him and assume the mantle of command, I was merely a party-addled, spoiled twat with no idea of what I was getting myself into. I still remember him criticizing me in between blows to his head as I tried to succeed him.


  Which is why just under 3 years after I took control, my entire army annihilated itself in spectacular fashion on the Plains of Sorrow following years of discontent and opposition to my idiotic and shortsighted agenda. Slaying itself to a man, fortunately for me.


  There was no one left to chase me down.



  Long story short, and as you've read many times over dedicated reader, I walked away and started my evil career over at very nearly the bottom of the Bad Guy food chain, a Village River Bully.


  I harassed folk when they tried to do laundry or wash their cooking pots. The river is now mine I declared and I charged them to do their menial, water-related business. When they sent stout men and village tough guys to drive me away I beat their asses and left the riverbank studded with their teeth and adorned with blood puddles.


  Then, after all the willing and able men had been smacked silly, they goaded the miller's hulking slave, Dermott Krullbjorn, to eject me from the premises.


  Dermott was and still is a motherfucking huge Northman with the overdeveloped suborbital ridges and protruding lower mandible of someone with more than a bit of Troll blood in him although he's really touchy on the subject. Conversations on the topic never last long for the unfortunate that brings it up.


  Being a slave, chained to a gristmill and doing the work of two mules everyday since he was 10, Dermott wasn't particularly thrilled to help his captor defend the village from anyone, much less a determined man handy with his fists and possessing a sword. But he decided his Master could make his life more difficult over the long run than some guy punching people if they didn't give him two copper shards for washing their loincloths.


  So he attacked me.


  We fought for about ten minutes, although because of my PR department, the official history says we fought from sunup to sundown, which is patently ridiculous. The miller's slave was insanely strong, but slow and untrained in fighting. He'd been pushing a two ton gristmill around in a circle for eleven years. Doesn't do much for your footwork or hand speed, but it will make you exceptionally robust and single minded.*2


  So we duked it out, hand to hand, de mano en mano. I knew as long as I didn't let him get his calloused mitts on me, that I could take him apart with precise strikes followed by evasion and I'd not have to use my sword. I repeated this over and over, all the while suggesting to him that even if he beat me, he'd be locked back up again to power the gristmill as the slave he was.


  The third time I knocked him down I offered him a hand to help him back to his feet and told him point blank, "If you join me now, you'll never be a slave again." A well timed breeze blew my hair back and away from my face at the precise moment and that looks comic-book cool no matter who you are. Dermott was impressed not only at the perfect timing of the favorable breeze, but more importantly that I had knocked him down three times already.


  He accepted my hand up and we proceeded to whup village ASS.


  And the rest is history as they say. Dermott pledged himself to my cause and all opposition to my authority in the village ceased. We got drunk afterwards and burned the gristmill down, but only after we'd sent the owner and his entire family through it. Looked like we'd tried to make flour from pomegranates.


  


  From there I planned a raid on the traditional enemy; the Next Village Over. Why should they have more sheep than us?


  This continued incrementally as I decided that I needed to honor my heritage by acquiring really nice things for myself at the expense of other people. And since they weren't smart nor resilient enough to resist me, I was rather successful at it if I do say so myself.



  Soon enough and due mainly to my own semi-sober brilliance, I had an army worth mentioning. Still weak compared to the level I'm at now, but very respectable for a former River Bully. I feinted East while I stuck to the West, smashing a pocket Elven kingdom and using their Holy Trees as lumber for my siege engines to topple the human kingdom that lay beyond them.


  Economy of movement and resources, my friends.



  This trend of stomping the fuck out of anything and everything continued for several years. My footgear grew ever so crusty with the blood of fallen opponents and my army grew more impressive with every victory. Before too long my empire had surpassed the one I inherited from Pops and I was swimming in gold.


  This was the era in my life where I decided it was time to give my boots some time to dry out and to look into the Adventurer-Luring side of the business. I was a complete novice in this regard, I had always taken the fight to others, now I wanted to see how the other half lived. I wanted the fucking Heroes of the world to come swording for me.


  What can I say? I've always had a profound lazy streak in me and I was growing tired of living out of a tent while on endless campaign.*3


  

  Thus was born The Canyon of the Arachnid King, probably my first real hit destination. In truth it didn't net me much money because of the ruinous fees the Guild of Giant Spider Wranglers charged me for maintenance and various arachnid herding expenses. But it did smoke several up and coming Heroes and against all odds became an overnight sensation.


  At the time, anyone who was Anyone in the Level 4-6 community took their shot at the Arachnid King*4. Everyone failed and left me lots of cool stuff to sell but enough came close to victory and lived to tell of it, cementing it's reputation forever.


  To this day, The Canyon of the Arachnid King ranks #59 on Dungeon Parade Magazine's 'All-Time Top 100 Dungeons, Ruins, Citadels, Deathmazes, Labyrinths and Places to Loot' list.


  Not bad for my first real attempt at an Adventure Destination.



  And since then I've pretty much covered the jist of my career direction in past installments of this free advice column. I could write a book on the topic, but that's not going to happen.




  Next time I'll talk about the evolution of my Hero-magnets and list my top ten successes in this demanding and competitive market.



Until then I remain,
Your Humble Overlord
Hurderoth



  











*1 This automatically gives my Dark Lord class a split option with the Lost Scion sub-class which I mainly branched into so my biographers had more to talk about and I got a free subscription to a monthly newsletter called "Assuming Heirs".








*2 Like Conan. But let's face it, Conan was an idiot. The epitome of the furry-jockstrap wearin, sword twirlin, shaggy haired fucking moron. Believed in Crom for fucksakes.








*3 Sure my 'tent' is 10,000 square feet, features 16 bedrooms with as many bathrooms. It has 2 hot tubs, a game room, three taverns and a dining area that could seat 500 people and it takes a team of 100 tent setter-uppers six hours to erect. But do't let that diminish, in your mind, the hardships I have to endure while campaigning.








*4 The Arachnid King was a female freelance Elder Giant Spider Mystic** who agreed to star in my death trap provided she didn't have to come out of her palatial web network more than once a week to slaughter some dumbfuck Adventurers and was allowed to lay eggs in anything she captured no matter how much it screamed.



**Her name was Octavia

Eating people seems pretty extreme except maybe on Special Occasions. Or Northern Wastelander Barbeque is better than Southern Jungle Barbeque based on the fat content of its closest general food source. Or nearest village. Whatever, there's no judgement in Barbeque.

  When it comes to cannibalism it may seem, to the casual observer, that humans have a bit of metaphysical sand in their metaphoric vaginas. I mean, in a survival situation, protein is protein. Why there's this stigma about eating your defeated enemies/weaker clan-mates in human society is just beyond me.


  It's not like I'm advocating dining on your fellow human. In theory it feels like a pretty grim practice, even for a evil person like myself. I've actually never grubbed on another human's flesh, the nearest I've come to that is dipping some toast in the yawning wounds of a vanquished enemy and that was more or less just a publicity stunt. Yolks are better. I'm just saying that I would if circumstances dictated it in regards to my continued existence. I think I could do wonderful things with various spices and possibly a Tandoori cooking pot.


  Many other non human cultures either embrace cannibalism or don't slap a scarlet letter on it like mankind does. Goblins, Gnolls, Lizardmen, Wererats, Kobolds to name a few. Why let good battle-meat go to waste when your enitre 'society' constantly dances on the edge of starvation because it hasn't grasped farming yet?


  Do what ya gotta do. It's a little known fact that virtually any meat sliced thin enough works great in a Philly Cheesesteak Format, and that almost no one asks questions about the meat in a fantastic tasting burrito. It's only when a hungry villager sees a limbless human torso roasting slowly on a spit over a fire that objections are often raised.


  So sharp eyed prospective Dark Lords take note: You absolutely can feed your populace the corpses of their enemies and friends as long as you do it in an unrecognizable way, i.e. Sloppy Josephs, Saul-sage pizzas, Mongolian 'Beef', Yankee Pot Roast, Tandoori Rival Villager, Mechanically Separated Hippie, Cholera Quiche, Anything Inna Taco, Soylent Green, you get the idea. The populace at large asks no questions if shit is tasty and cheap.


  It's like Chik fil-A in a certain timeline, everyone knows it's seal meat, but it tastes so damn good that they all pretend to believe it's chicken so they can keep eating it. It will eventually lead to the creation of a vat-grown seal meat composite after all wild seals have been hunted to extinction to satisfy the hunger of an out of control human population.



  So if we're gonna delve into what us human beings refer to as 'cannibalism', then let's delve deep shall we?


  I'm talking cultural cuisine in its most traditional sense. The darkest of cook books for us humans.



  Listed here for the sheltered among us:






  Kandarian Fried Captive: 37 secret herbs and hallucinogens make for a good meal and a mind bending digestion period. This style of cooking is NOT recommended for amateurs to cannibalism or psychogenics.




  Norwegian Danish-Reaver Liver: Fucking Danes tried to raid your homestead and they were easier to kill than sharks. After you and your fjord-mates have slain them, bury them four feet deep in tidal sand for 3-6 months, depending on environmental conditions. When they've ripened, dig em up and cut out their livers. Tell your village it's the traditional rotten shark liver you all know and love.


  They'll never know the difference.




  Mountain Pass Meatloaf: You've shown Hubris your tender asshole by starting a mountain crossing over two months late. Any intelligent and mildly experienced traveler would've waited until the next Spring to start their journey, but someone convinced a whole lot of other gullible dipshits to follow them into a white nightmare.


  Next thing ya know, bone broths recipes are being dusted off and dinner parties planned...




  Orgy Stew: You're the successful leader of a popular nationwide Snake-Cult. Your followers willingly die for you and end life as hors de oeuvres for your unsuspecting diplomatic guests. When you reward your Inner Circle with a depraved Orgy, used up sex slaves are chopped up into a grey stew and served from a steaming cauldron into corn bread bowls with a quail's egg on top because you're a classy motherfucker.



  South Island Long Pig: Let's be frank, 'long pig' is a rustic, colloquial term for "human we're going to cook and eat". Whether it's a captured enemy or someone your witch doctor/religious figure has suggested may be evil, in the end there's gonna be a party and a Bar-B-Q. Best be on the side that needs a toothpick when all is said and done...



  Grassland Dude and Chips: Humans don't have the same texture as whitefish, even when battered up good and deep fried, but steppe dwelling savages who've never even seen a fish don't know or care about that. A lack of tartar sauce technology further hurts this people-based ode to classic fish and chips, but they do have some sort of tuber which when fried makes a wonderful chip and their vinegar, while lacking that nice malt flavor, is sufficient.




Eloi Stir Fry: On some worlds, humankind diverges into one or more distinct species. Sometimes one of these offshoots decides to start eating the other one because not only is it an easy food source, it's fun. On a planet who's resources have been plundered to a standstill, easy to catch prey becomes very attractive no matter how many legs it has.




  So what can you take away from this, would be Dark Lord?


  Well for one thing, you should get your taco carts up and running after a battle but long before the cattle arrive, if you know what I mean. Back in the early days when I was rebuilding the Empire I had frittered away, I had to use fallen enemy to feed my troops because the herd of cattle I'd secured for that exact purpose had been lost to a hoof and mouth epidemic and I couldn't spare any horses for meat. So I made my famous Philly Cheesesteak and Taco War Wagons. I used to run ambulance carts straight to the processing wagons who delivered directly to the chuck wagons. Freshest meat possible in theory.



  Bottom line is that my troops loved grub time and I fed them well when we had substantial victories. It filled the void cheaply while I secured less potentially morale breaking food sources. So in a pinch, just dress it up in tasty sandwiches and never consider as a long term solution.




  I feel like this addressed the cannibalism question in regards to how it may relate to a struggling Dark Lord wannabe such as those who may or may not be reading this at the moment.





   So let's wrap this up and be thankful it came this far, shall we?




Yours in Abjectationness,

-Lord Hurderoth

His May Be Law, Word

Cavalry, the most diverse unit in any Dark Lord's bag of tricks. Or, the smug feeling of having stuff no one else has.

 When you've been an insanely wealthy Totalitarian Conqueror for as long as I have, you tend to start collecting stuff for no other reason than to stave off the boredom of a life without any real challenge to it. Some people collect stamps, others coins. Some like toys and others may fancy empty beer bottles for some reason.


  I collect several things and fortunately for me, I can't be outbid on any of them. There is no upper limit to my financial resources, I'm not even sure how much gold I'm worth, I just know there is a silly amount of zeroes after the first number.


  Silly, I say.


 And in the event someone does manage to procure something I covet somehow, I just raise my bid to include my Undead Dragon with optional Undead Lich Knight NOT burning you and everything you hold dear into a tasteful silhouette etched on seared marble.


  This always wins.


  That being said I've collected and hoarded various things in my day, but my latest obsession is Cavalry. I've been adding crazy amounts of cavalry units to my army lately because I really like them and may have developed a minor obsession with them.  The versatility and variability of the unit model alone is mind boggling, so much room for customization. There are almost endless combinations of creatures that can be ridden by other creatures, preferably with some semblance of order and in which both rider and mount are viable weapons.


  Once you become a serious collector, and by that I mean a minimum of 100 different detachments of Cavalry (no duplicates), you generally start to seek out the rarest and most sought after pieces you can find. Ideally in mint condition.






  So to borrow a tried and true method, here's a Top Ten list of the rarest and most fucking expensive Cavalry units in my current collection in no particular order:





1) Dinosaur Mounted Neutral Clerics: Some Clerics worship gods of negotiable moral standing and those are the ones who are able to serve Dark Lords as oftentimes donations=righteousness.

  Works for me. Evil alignment Clerics aren't great at healing. They're generally are too busy cutting hearts out of virgins and raising the dead to really think about helping something else stay alive. Therefore as a Black Hearted Bastard you have to find Neutral Clerics for the bulk of your army's healing needs.


  The problem with this for most lesser Evil Dicks is that these Clerics certainly aren't frontline troops: ergo to be effective at their jobs, Dark Lords with less resources than myself have to have their wounded hauled back to behind their lines to where these Mending Cunts can go to work on them.


  But when you're operating at the very apex of Dark Lordery, like me, you can afford Neutral Clerics who happened to be mounted on trained Triceratops, thus negating the need to haul bleeding meat back through the thick of battle to where your Band-Aid Twats can fix em up.


  They go to the wounded and do their thing. The fucking Triceratops keeps them alive while they do it. Usually. Its a fucking Battle, sometimes shit happens...


  Most Dark Lords don't have these. Envy me.


2) Dire Wolf Mounted Mind Flayers : Sure, every Dark Lord worth the name has some Wolf Rider Goblins in their bag of tricks, why wouldn't you? Wolf Riding Anything are probably the very best land based scouts you can get, their efficacy varying depending on what's riding them.


  Most Wolf-Rider units are goblins, spectacularly useful, but let's face it, kinda ho-hum for a serious Dark Lord. Wolf mounted Orcs are much rarer because Orcs don't get along with animals the same way Goblins do, probably because they eat them.


  But both those units pale in comparison to my Direwolf Mounted Mind Flayers. The entire unit is comprised of only six Flayers astride the hugest Dire Wolves my eugenics program could produce. It may be a tiny squad compared to most elements of my forces, but in sheer destructive force, few can rival it.


  A weapon that can cripple the minds of vast numbers of enemies simultaneously, thus allowing your regular troops to slog through swamps of their unresisting entrails, is invaluable.


  As far as my researchers have been able to determine, there's only one other organized troop of Mind Flayers out there, and apparently they're mounted on Hippogriffs, which is awesome. I'm currently looking to buy them/kill their current owner and take them.



3) Jackalope Mounted Gnome Illusionists: Wanna create some absolute fucking chaos among your opponents? Sure you do, nothing is more fun to watch than an opposing army go all batshit on itself. For enemies of lower sophistication, i.e without adequate magical support, Illusionists are a bargain way to win the day.


  A smart and efficient Dark Lord isn't going to deploy his top tier units against a teeming horde of aggressive beardfucks barely out of the Stone Age, nossir. There is way too much room for Fate to stick her fickle finger up your ass; some ONE IN A MILLION CHANCE gambit that somehow, against all laws of probability, works.*1

  Nope. For primitive, numbers-based foes, you deploy the David Copperfields of your army, the Illusionist. A magic user who specializes in special effects that are easy to counter for more advanced adversaries, yet are all too real and fucking horrifying to your average 'rustics'.


  They work way cheaper than real spell slingers and can be used against more worldly troops as feints and distractions while your real nightmare units wreak havoc among the enemy, penning symphonies of death, violence and terror to lull you to sleep at night.


  So this particular unit of Jackalope Mounted Gnome Illusionists is only one of two known to exist. I cannot say enough about them; they are insanely agile units capable of arriving anywhere on a front within minutes. They are astonishingly effective in their role as agents of mobile chaos, providing magical cover and misdirection of defenses that might otherwise be directed against my actual sorcerous strikes.


  Plus they're cute and frequently drunk, although it doesn't affect their job performance in the slightest. And who can resist big rabbits with antlers?



4 ) Snow-Wyrm Mounted Yeti Mountain Dragoon Crossbowmen: Holy Shit. Most people don't even know what a Snow-Wyrm is, much less can envison a crossbow armed Yeti sitting on it while it bears down on your screaming, trapped army stretched out through a snow-choked mountain pass. There's gonna be a lot of red and brown snow and your SWMYMDC's are gonna glide right over it, raining death and dismemberment to their blindly fleeing prey.


  I find watching their snow staining antics pairs best with some brandy laced hot chocolate. Preferably from a chateau balcony, but in a pinch your campaign tent will do. It's the show that counts, not where you watch it from.


  "Crossbowmen" doesn't really do this unit justice. These are Yeti, 8-9 foot tall fur covered Winter Wookies armed with what would better be described as 'small ballistas' rather than 'crossbows'. Anything that can go completely through up to 4 armored humans can't realistically be considered a 'crossbow' any more.


  As Dragoons, these frightening Wampa-Fooks ride Snow Wyrms into battle, yet dismount to fight. And unlike human Dragoons, their mounts join right in independently, sinuous snow-dragons of a Eastern cast, faster than Norwegian downhillers, but bus sized with giant teeth and a Cold Blast breath weapon.


  Won them in a hand of poker.



5 ) Giant-Vole Mounted Dwarven Sappers: Need a battlement toppled in a hurry? Pesky citadel walls making mincemeat of your storming attempts? Get some Dwarves, boyo. Tunnel those fortifications right the fuck under. Watch em tumble like someone blew a Magic Horn.


  Dwarven Sappers are the premiere engineering units available on the open market. They command astronomical rates and are 100% worth every silver if you can find some to work for you. I can't recommend them enough.


  Therefore if you're given the opportunity to procure some Giant Vole Mounted Dwarven Sappers, you say yes and pay whatever is demanded/burn whatever is necessary to get them. For those of you among my readership ignorant of low level biology, a vole is a toothier, more aggressive version of a mole which doesn't sound impressive at all until you're facing one that's thirty feet long bursting from under your defensive works bearing a screaming, armored cunt of a Dwarf on its back right before your wall collapses on you.



6) Giant Arachnid Mounted Drow Archer-Magi: Crazy-evil and merciless. The detailed atrocities these spider-knight-wizards enjoy perpetrating on your or anyone's else's behalf will both exhilarate and appall you. Like you totally get having to horrifically execute one family member after another, leading up to their Patriarch, who defied you, but there shouldn't be that much cackling and sexual arousal involved. Or games. Weird sex-murder games.



  I'm mean there are standards, ya know?


  Wear a codpiece for fuck's sake. We're Lawful Evil over here, show some decorum.




7) Undead Dragon Mounted Lich-Knight*2: Pretty much the pinnacle in airbourne death and misery, I currently own and operate the only airworthy Unit of this dread class. My Undead Dragon's name is Hershel and he enjoys combustible cities and towns, conflagration-assisted updrafts, large herds of reasonably easy to catch, meaty animals and the occasional Princess when he can get one.


  His rider is the angry and reanimated corpse of Sir Attilus of CinderFall, an Undead Knight turned from Light to Darkness. He enjoys moonlit walks on the beach where he can eat and stomp large amounts of hatchling sea turtles to death, bludgeoning anything cute and fluffy and directing his Mount to incinerate a humble population of agrarian-based dirt-fucks because I told him to do it.


  No one else in this particular world flies this Unit. I'm that good.


  If you're wondering how this is a cavalry unit, then you should've read the Footnotes first.



8) War-Mammoth Mounted Stone Giant Lancers: Dark Lords of lesser standing should avoid this unit, both Rider and Mount are dumb as a box of rocks. They are useless for any maneuver more complicated than "Go that way!" and either are easily panicked to turn in fear and confusion against your own front line, creating acres of bowel-pasta among the very forces they were intended to spearhead.


  Still, when attached to a force that can disintegrate them at will if the worst should happen, or is planning on them balking just for sheer entertainment's sake, they make excellent Shock Cav. Human sized opponents have very little chance of  surviving a concentrated charge by Cavalry weighing in individually at an average of 8-10 tons, armored as fuck and moving at an inexorable 15 miles per hour or better.


  Their various weaponry and genitalia swinging madly to and fro.


  Truly terrifying Unit for the Dark Lord who can absorb the potential losses, or just doesn't care about them.


  Fun either way.



9) Gargoyle Mounted Pixie-Blowgunners: Sounds improbable, right? But think about it, Pixies are the naturalist masters of rural herbicology. They can manufacture an astounding variety of potent pharmacological compounds from the bounty of the wildlands they hail from. Ergo, obtaining the services of a mercenary Unit of Pixie Pharma-Operatives who ride Fucking Gargoyles into ambush scenarios, should be a top priority for any Malevolent Prick worth the title.


  It's a no brainer. And in their downtime, they can dart random people at the orgies you throw, making them more pliable to your perversions. Double win.



10) Cave Bear Mounted Cimmerians: Don't let the loincloths fool you, these sword waving muscle-heads riding semi-tame Cave Bears are a serious threat to your shield wall. You see Cave Bears, as a species, don't believe in shield walls, much in the same way as some humans don't believe in a God. It just ain't there to them really. Where's the proof?


  This puts any defensive structure comprised of living creatures at serious risk; they need foes to believe in their defense, to acknowledge the potential risk of attacking their line. This lack of recognition in giant fucking Cave Bears makes this notion a weakness that their shirtless Blade-Twirling Riders will surely exploit.


  They're clever enough for that.





  This concludes today's topic and let me end with this advice:


  Try not to suck at picking Cavalry Units. Consider all facets of the campaign, terrain chief among them. The majority of you aspiring Dark Lords out there will eventually be defeated without becoming more than a regional nuisance, easily defeated by a backwoods Cleric or Hedge Knight. You fucking pussy.


  But don't let the odds discourage you. Dying is better than making barrels all day or tanning leather for the rest of a short, miserable life.


  Keep your eyes on the one just above you, and have a plan...




Yours in ideological Supremacy,

-Lord Hurderoth

Like Be Law Word His















*1 See also: David vs Goliath



*2 Honestly, this is an Airborne Calvary Unit (AirCav), not strictly speaking a Cavalry Unit. But due to the fact that I have the only one of its kind AND because it does just fine on the ground too, I chose to mention it here, because of it badassedness.

  Seriously. Envy me.

Shock Troops: an essential Dark Lord accessory. Or, giant line-smashers: which is right for me?

  Here's the deal: until you have the strength to do a full-array pitched field battle against a foe with an equally impressive fucking army, you're not really a Dark Lord. Not in the true sense. You know, classically  speaking. Your might crushing empires under the appropriate footwear and so forth.


  Not at all like "torching the next village over." Or, "snafflin a good tirty 'ead o' coobeastie from dem wretched McCutcheon mooderfookers, yeah"


  No. A real DARK LORD has, for true, at least one Dread Army/Horde under his/her command and probably more than that. I personally don't take anyone seriously who doesn't have at least one large army that includes at minimum of six or seven of the following elements to it:


1) Magical Support: Defensive/Regenerative

2) Magical Support: Offensive/Killy

3) Main Body

4) Missile Corps:

  a) Archers

  b) Slingers

  c) Siege Engines

  d) Crossbowmen

  e) Giants throwing various livestock and bits of landscape

5) Shock Troops

6) Harrier Units

7) Aerial Units:

  a) Transport/Resupply

  b) Attack, Demoralize, Capture, Terminate

8) Naval Forces (where applicable)

9) Calvary:

  a) Light Dragoons

  b) Heavy Calvary (fully armored, no nonsense wall of iron and horseflesh type of shit)

  c) Mounted Archers (works well for small, nomadic people riding ponies)

  d) Totally sick Raptor riding knights astride wicked-clawed reptilian mounts. Fuckin sweet as fuck.

  e) Dragon Knights (you have arrived...)

10) Engineers: Everyone hates them cuz they're frequently Dwarves but who cares? Provide them with enough sex, money and whatever else you can get them hooked on, or kidnap their loved ones and they're yours. They make collapsing castle walls and digging counter insurgency tunnels refreshingly not your problem.


  A formidable Dark Lord will have all of these assets at his disposal, and probably more. Personally, I have so many different variations of these elements that I sometimes lose track of them all and have to allocate lesser subjugations to my underlings.



  SO shock troops are the pride and joy of your armed forces.The crown jewels in a tiara of relentless brutality. If you think in a 20th century frame of mind, then shock troops are the tanks and armored core of your army. They exist to break shield walls and demoralize your foes through sheer intimidation, fear and ass stomping effectiveness.



The best candidates for shock troops depend on what sort of foe you're facing. Being as fucking humans are the dominant species on most worlds we're talking about here, let's start with the proper Shock Troops for smashing those wee bitty bipeds to pieces, shall we?




TROLLS: I really like Trolls for Shock Troops and Harrier Units. They're great, hulking, well armored brutes, generally around nine feet tall, strong as 10 men and are unusually resistant to most things outside of fire. They regenerate rapidly: a troll that has had an arm lopped off can be pulled from battle for two days while its severed limb regrows.


  Try that with a human...


  As long as you have an Anti-Fire asset in your deck of cards to deal with flame-flingers, Trolls make first rate Shock Troops. Nothing like seeing a giant enemy eating your fallen dead to really take the fight out of you.



ORCS: Orcs make good Shock Troops, they're aggressive, unafraid of death and are mostly able to focus on breaking down an enemy's defense before they allow themselves to indulge in an orgy of rape, slaughter and looting. Discipline is an underrated attribute in some Dark Lords' books.


  That being said, Orcs, while fearsome in their own right, don't deliver the bowel-loosening terror of larger, more exotic motherfuckers. Humans are horrified by armored humanoids larger than them, the bigger Shock Troops you can attain, the less likely it will be that you pathetic human adversary will even attempt to stand against you.



BUGBEARS: I've mentioned Bugbears before in this blog because they make excellent clandestine, small unit troops. They would make fine Shock Troops if you could manage to rally enough of them together for long enough to fight for you without them turning on each other.


  You see, Bugbears are like the Scotsmen of non-human bipeds, they enjoy fighting each other on a clan by clan basis more than any other sentient creature in the multiverse. Ergo, gathering enough of them in one force to be your advance butcher-corps will be highly unlikely if not impossible.



OGRES: They tend to be an independent species and aren't very smart, so convincing them to work in a unified fashion is more or less impossible. Even if you're fortunate enough to land a family of them, it's like herding more than two people while they're on acid-virtually fucking hopeless.


  Which is a shame because if you could get a hundred or so to fight for you, no purely human shield wall would be able to stand against them.



GIANTS: Yeah, sure. Keep dreamin. No Dark Lord in history has been able to assemble a meaningful battalion of giants outside of Thrym, who was the king of the Ice Giants and it still didn't do him any good versus the Aesir.


 Giants are incredibly independent creatures, regardless of race. They are very rare, compete with each other for territory and breed with glacial slowness. Consider yourself a successful Dark Lord if you can convince even one of them to fight for you, much less enough to form a line.


  Now that I've mentioned that, even one giant, properly armored and trained, can decimate a human shield wall. When you have a single determined Giant working for you, you often don't need a Shock Troop Corps, because they ARE the Shock Troop Corps. They wade through puny human opponents like Andre the Giant kicking his way through an obstinate kindergarten class. Unstoppable.


LIZARDMEN: Hail from a swamp, do ya? Lizardman is more or less a generic term for a variety of repto-humanoids. I don't pretend to know all the variations, I have people I pay handsomely to keep track of all that shit for me. What I do know is that lizardmen are generally an order of magnitude better than human troops at nearly everything. They're faster, usually stronger, have tough scaly hides like natural armor and are adept at using weapons. They can run faster, longer and jump higher than any normal man and many of their races possess regenerative abilities like their reptile cousins.


 Discipline can be an issue, but I've found that selectively burning a few of them every now and then gets your message across. And that message is OBEY.


  If you're considering using Lizardmen as an element of shock troop in your forces, do your research, it's no use obtaining a horde of amphibious Lizardmen if you're planning to war in desert, steppe or mountain settings. Dried up Lizardmen are of no use to anyone.


GNOLLS: Savage and chaotic, gnolls make a dicey choice for Shock Troops. They had better be more afraid of you than they are of whoever they're attacking or they'll either break and run or turn on you. Discipline is always gonna be a problem with these hyena headed humanoids. They're moderately intelligent compared to say, dogs, but that ain't saying much.


  They do come with a couple of attributes that make them desirable troops, just not in a massive, intimidating front line troop sort of way. They have excellent night vision, hearing and sense of smell, all things better utilized in a night sentry/stealth capacity than breaking shield walls. They are also surprisingly skilled with a longbow, the best of them can match or best the more adept human archers, although obviously they're not up to Elven standards. Elves being the best archers, period.


THE UNDEAD: So fucking boring. So fucking lame. So insanely easy to kill. Why anyone outside of a Necromancer would opt to use zombies/skeletons as their assault troop of choice is beyond me. Their disadvantages far outweigh their strengths unless you can muster enough of them for a truly awe inspiring horde, but that ain't easy. Think relative populations in context of the world you're trying to subjugate. Generally speaking there aren't usually enough readily accessible corpses just lying around in convenient heaps waiting to be reanimated. You also have to consider the might of the Nercomancer(s) raising them. How many can they raise? How many can they keep under their power at any one time? Are they delegating control to some upper level undead lieutenants like Vampires, Liches or Revenants?


  Too many weaknesses for my taste, especially against some benevolent God worshipping do-gooders whose clerics live for reducing abominations to ash.


ELEMENTALS: If you have the wherewithal to employ some Elementals as your Stormtroopers, ya gotta do it. Not much can make a human shield wall shit it's chain mail better than rampaging spirits wholly clad in fire, earth, air or gods forbid, plasma. (And of course water if you have nautical aims.) Earth Elementals in particular are phenomenal at breaking defensive lines because they can come up from underneath them, and being constructed of the very soil itself, swords and conventional weaponry will be about as useful as caramel armor on a warm day.


  Elementals say to your foe, 'I've got serious magic, bitch. You better have some too or my army will be home in time for Midsummer's Eve."


MONGREL ABOMINATIONS/MUTANTS: If you're a Mad Sorcerer who enjoys dabbling in a little DNA based dark magic, why not just fuse captured enemies with various wild animals and unleash your tortured monster horde against your current foe? If I was a batshit crazy, fume huffin Evil Wizard that's exactly what I'd do.


  Cost effective, and chock full o' job satisfaction.


  Sure there are drawbacks. Discipline may be one of them, complete and utter madness may be another. But I'd bet ya that savagery won't be an issue.



MINOTAURS: Great idea, but world's where Minotaurs exist in large enough populations to make a decent corps of Shock Troops are rare indeed. If you happen to be fortunate enough to exist in such a world and can convince enough of them to fight under your banner, best do it, boyo. Bullheads are tough fighters, skilled with big, fuck-off weapons and they don't die easy. They fight well in clan units, fiercely loyal to their leader and their line breaking charges are legendary.


  Still, out of the range of your average Dark Lord, but definitely worth mentioning here.




  So there you have it, would be Grim Bastards. Ten Shock Troop choices for your consideration. Tune in next week when I discuss the pros and cons of a really terrifying Calvary.


Until then, yours in malevolence,


-Lord Hurderoth


Law His Maybe Word

Artefacts Roadshow: How to find out if your antiquated shit is magic or not and how to get top gold piece for it.

  So you think you great grandpappy's sword may be magic? He was a Hero of great renown and slew many a name-brand monster with it. It's old, it's survived great battles with only aesthetic damage and by default must be magic, right? The family stories tell of it lopping off the toes of an Iron Colossus....


  Most likely you're wrong. Enchanted swords are insanely rare, in a world inundated by swords and related edged weaponry, only a fraction of a percent of existing weapons will be magical and only a tinier fraction will be of  Dark Lord-worthy kickassiness.


  That does not mean it doesn't have value. By all means if you're forced to sell your family's heritage, educate yourself and get top coin for it. Don't take it to a pawn shop like some common druggie. Research that shit, boyo. Expend some jangle to get some jangle.


  Who made it? When? Smiths on every world become collectible due to the quality of their work. Does it have a Maker's Mark? This is stuff you should know if you have to part out your family's glory to cover your gambling debts or whore-tabs.


  If you're counting on someone who buys and sells magic items for a living to tell you fair and true what your blade/various item is worth, then you should walk in backwards with your pants down and your ass pre-lubed, cuz you're gonna get fucked son. Real proper like.


  No dinner first.



  For you rank novices out there, here are some clues that your family blade may be magical:




1) You dropped it one day and it lopped and anvil in half on the way to the floor

2) It landed point first in a marble floor and sank in halfway to the hilt

3) Once unsheathed, it refuses to be sheathed again until it has tasted blood

4) Armor doesn't seem to make a difference to it

5) It glows every now and then

6)  Someone you're descended from pulled it out of a fucking rock

7) It talks to you

8) It turned a 16 year old turnip farmer's son into the greatest hero a nation had ever seen

9) Your ancestor was given it by a watery bitch from a lake

10) It has an exaggerated SCHIIIIING! sound when you pull it from the scabbard, or you can hear dark choral music whenever it is unsheathed.

11) It never rusts. Ever. Can't remember the last time you oiled the damned thing....

12) It bursts into flames when unscabbarded

13) It'll cut through an Iron Colussus's toe.



  But for fuck's sake, do some experiments with it before you spend coin on someone divining its 'powers' for you.

  If you can't make it do anything special, but can't seem to hurt the blade either, then you might just have a non magical but incredibly well crafted weapon, which can be worth as much or more than one with an enchantment. Collectors love rare and master-built things. Just because Grandpop's sword can't hurl fireballs or injure ethereal beings, doesn't mean it isn't a Masterblade forged by a legend.


  Magic ain't everything when it comes to vintage weaponry.



  And speaking of that, weaponry ain't everything either. Most adventurers' worth the name are all kitted up with magic items. The heavy hitters, that is. Armor, cloaks, vests, gauntlets, boots, bags, backpacks, pouches, codpieces, wands, staves and rods, virtually anything might carry an enchantment.*1



  My Aunt Maggie used to have a Tattered Cloak of the Barren Furrow, which when worn during sexual intercourse, would kill any potential pregnancies. She rented it out with great success to teenaged girls in the surrounding villages at 3 coppers a night. I only saw her wearing it once because it was always booked. She used several years worth of the proceeds to buy a slaving ship and the rest, as they say, is history. She built a small empire which my Father eventually inherited, expanded greatly and left to me when I bludgeoned him to death. I can still remember him giving me advice in between blows to his noggin with the bronze gargoyle...


  Things like: "Aargh! Hit me harder!" and "More to the right, no YOUR right!" and "Aim for my temple you dim-witted fuckhat!".


  The only reason I remember Aunt Maggie's infanticidal outerwear is through family legends and because after it ran out of charge, she used it for a goat blanket and when I was a kid I mistakenly thought goats were cool animals.


  So don't readily discount retired Barbarian Uncle Ned's War Loincloth, or Great Aunt Vaiya's Knobbly Wand That Mysteriously Vibrates. What about your Great-Great-Great Grandad's Greaves of Grievously Grim Goll-Thwacking? Yes they look like budget, pressed tin shin guards for the economic and hopeful soldier, but maybe they grant the ability to kick a foe's gonads up through his throat? Have you tried that?


  How did it work out for you?


  That's the thing, ya never know for sure. Magic items never come with an instruction sheet, with the exception of the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch, they and their use were either passed down to a successor, or were lost with the death of the owner.


 For those with the economic wherewithal, this is where the Research Mage comes into play. Research Magi are fucking worthless in battle, but invaluable in identifying and learning about Enchanted Items. They live for it, the chubby, pimply faced bastards. They can't resist a challenge even if it could end in their sudden and unexpected deaths.


  In some ways they might even be considered more ballsy than those spell-slingers who go into battle. At least in battle you can usually see what's trying to kill you and how it's attempting to accomplish it. Poking around with unknown and potentially lethal magic items normally doesn't come with an long life expectancy.


  Which is why, as a successful and wealthy Dark Lord, you have to seek talent out and more importantly, be willing to pay for it/find it's weakness and exploit it. Despite my nominally evil nature, I've found through experience that paying generously works better in the long run to more Dark Lordly methods, such as holding an asset's family hostage, torture, curses and smacking them in the head when they get out of line.


  Greed is almost always the best weakness to exploit in my opinion. People under your control become terrified of losing the easy lifestyle and casual luxuries your reign has afforded them and that fear alone can be worth countless hostages or innumerable small cruelties.


  A content asset, as much as I hate to admit it, is better than a vengeful, angry or frightened one any day of the week.


  Luckily for all you up and coming Malevolent Madmen and indeed, anyone out there with a bit of coin and some suspicions about a certain item, I've made your lives easier with yet another of my seemingly endless innovations: Magic Item Research Enclaves, or MIRES in DarkLordSpeak.


  MIRES are "freelance"*2 corporations who employ vast networks of research scholars, historians and mages to expertly identify various magic items, weapons and armor, and figure out, for a fee, how to use them without killing yourself and those around you. To the beginner or journeyman adventurer utilizing a MIRE may not be realistically affordable, especially if they find out you that what you have a +1 Sword of Mild Annoyance, or a mostly spent Wand of Ballistic Hamsters. The sale price of which wouldn't even come close to covering the MIRE's fee. Therefore you either try to learn enough about the item to discover if it's even worth the expenditure, or you fucking gamble, plain and simple.


  BUT if the item in question turns out to be a potent magical thang, their fees will more than be made up for by figuring out what bit of arcane kit you've wrested from the clutches of it's former owner and how not be instantly maimed or killed when using it. If your item has certain drawbacks, such as taking a year from your life with every use, making you impotent or infertile or even something weird like transforming you into a tasteful reproduction of a popular watercolor for six hours a month every third Wednesday, you're gonna wanna know about it.


  It could be really important.


  After a MIRE has given you a result and you decide to cash that motherfucker in*3, they will frequently suggest you use an Auction House or Purveyor to make the sale for you, for a percentage of course. All MIRE's have partnerships or associations with multiple sale outlets because frequently their clients have acquired a Weapon or Item that is completely outside of their experience or Class. What the hell would a Ranger need a wand for? Or a Wizard need a morningstar?


  Sell that crap and buy something Class-appropriate for fook's sake. The Pros will get a better price for it than you will, because they know people like me, and you're just a dungeon looter. No offense intended.


  There ya go, would be Dictators everywhere. Be smart with sales of your eldritch booty, don't just let some mid level operator rob you blind because you're drunk and stupid. True Dark Lord material will always come out on top in financial situations as well as the decimation of one's enemies.


  Hope you learned something today, toady.




-Wroth Lord Hurderoth
Colder Than Broth On Hoth















*1 As a scholar of weird and unorthodox Artefacts, I can tell you that one of the single most unique and irreverent magic items ever created was Mollifer's Drumstick of Immolation. The story is long, but to put it inna nutshell:

  Two Wizards were drinking heavily and gambling on a number of table top games that only Wizards would understand or be able to play. They dined indiscriminately on roasted chickens as they gamed and drank and eventually, as Fate would have it, they made a Wager.

  One of the Spell-Monkey's wagered the other that he couldn't Enchant a well gnawed chicken bone in sixty minutes or less.

  As anyone even mildly educated on Enchanting knows, imbuing an inanimate object with magical power is a painstaking and time consuming job requiring precision, patience and an extremely high level of competence. It isn't at all like Warmagery, where spells need to be fired off in an instant. Enchanting consists basically of convincing something that doesn't have a mind that it should listen to you when you suggest it should become magical. That it will like it.

  The result was that a small, underdeveloped chicken femur was transformed into a handheld holocaust that could emit a stream of liquid fire over 20 feet for a period of 30 seconds a day, parsed out however you wished. Mollifer accomplished this Enchantment in 58 minutes and 47 seconds to win the bet.


  His opponent then immolated him with it, thus cementing its Name forever and ensuring he didn't have to pay up on their wager.**





   **I bought it at a rummage sale some three centuries later for four copper pieces as a 'folk art' drumstick. My research department discovered it's secrets for me (which I pay them exceedingly well to do) and current market value on it is something like 8,700 to 10,000 gold marks.





*2 And by "freelance" I mean I own and run every single one of them. Very profitable. Occasionally I open new ones just to fuck with the older, more established MIRES. I subsidize them to keep divining fees artificially low, thus shaming these potbellied non-belligerent magic-mooks.





*3 I recommend using a Purveyor or established Auction House for selling anything even remotely mid-range and up. Yes they are going to charge you up to 25%**, but they have buyers available to them that your alehouse-hero ass doesn't. Serious money people looking to buy interesting shit.


    **My advice is haggle for 15%, but be careful with threats because any organization that has many Items of great power and value in its possession at any given moment will have a fuckton of firepower to protect those Items.

A post to assuage the butthurt of the lesser class "Dark Lords".

 *Yes I know one of the quote marks is backwards. I tried fixing it three different ways and none of them worked. Fuck you Blogger.

 First off, if I hadn't already assassinated the Hierarchy of Doom, then they would have censured me for even referring to anyone under level 20 as a 'Dark Lord'. It's a title that's an acknowledgment of a high level of success, as well as a job description. So, for those under a minimum of fifteenth level, I'm doing you a flattery by even including you in a discussion aimed at actual Dark Lords.


  Be thankful.


 I have been criticized to a moderate degree of late for only offering advice that will be of use to very advanced level Dark Lords, ignoring the plethora of aspiring talent out there, scheming endlessly in their quest for meaningful power.


  I call rocshit on that because I have frequently offered sage counsel to my lowly would be brethren. Remember, I was born into high level privilege but ruined it by being a short-sighted sack-wart and as a result had to start over again at the bottom of the food chain. I have been there, done that and bought the tunic.


  I have lived it.


  So for some pompous minded readers to suggest that I am not mindful of my (secondary) roots, well, it just pisses me off. I will find their worlds and conquer them even if I have to invent spaceships and warp drives, I don't care. My quest to destroy them will give my life meaning, and when you have it all, after a while, a reason to get up every day is a valuable thing indeed.


  That being stated, let's get into some rank level shit here, m'kay? To satisfy those naysayers whose world's I'm going to burn eventually. Sound good?




  It's time for your first 'fortress'. You've reached that 5th or 6th level that says "I'm ready to establish my very first stronghold, let's cut some logs and and mix some wattle and daub. Make sure there's space inside for the livestock".


  It isn't gonna be majestic or even imposing to anyone who could operate a longbow or throw a rock, but it will be your first Evil Holdfast. A place where your slowly growing alliance of scumbags, cutthroats and swords for hire can coagulate while you plan atrocities for them to commit.


  The form this den of inequity will take depends largely on the landscape you power base is located within. You wouldn't for example expect to build a log palisade in the desert, or a subterranean bunker in fathomless loam, would you?


  Only if you're 'have an Uncle-Daddy' stupid.


  SO, this will seem like very basic advice, but that's the theme of this post.


  Build your first defiant structure within the means provided by your sphere of control. What this entails , for the small minded and big dreamed idiots among you, is that you're not going to carve an Ice Castle in a jungle. Nor are you going to be able to build a Granite Fortress in a bog because it will sink until your bed floats and your guards drown.


  Use your head you drooling embarrassment.


  I can see this is going to be an uphill battle, so let me break it down for all you over-muscled, under-brained wannabes out there. I will also preface this by stating that at early levels, your first Dread Fortress may just be a particular island in a swamp. Or a hidden glen in a forest, a cave etc etc. It won't necessarily be any sort of structure in the man made sense.

  Sometimes your headquarters is just a bolt hole no one else knows about. There is no shame in this, or very little anyway.


FOREST: You have two ways you can go here.*1


    A) The Hidden Forest Stronghold. When you're just starting out, oftentimes all you need is a place to run when it gets too hot in the kitchen so to speak. Robin Hood had one of these. Just a big ass oak tree located so deep in a primeval forest, that no one else could find it without him knowing about it well in advance.

  That's it. Just a tree. No palisade or walls, didn't require it.


   B) The 'Everyone Knows Where It Is' Forest Stronghold. That's because you've cleared the land well beyond bowshot so you can see folks a-comin. You've put up your motte and bailey "castle" squarely in the center and every now and then you lead your collection of evil fucks out of the gates to perpetrate horrible shit on the surrounding countryside, or your enemy's hamlet.


SWAMP: I don't recommend this AT ALL. Swamps and bogs are fine for seeking refuge in once you've burned someone else's real estate, but for fuck's sake, don't try to build anything there. It's merely an escape route and safe spot to gather your resources, gird your loins and plot your next violent power/money grab.


  I knew a Dark Lord once who tried building a Forbidding Swamp Keep, against my advice I might add.


  Well lo and behold it sank into the swamp. So he built a second one and it sank into the swamp. The third one burned down, fell over and sank into the swamp. But his forth one is still standing to the best of my knowledge, gods bless him and his pigheadedness. Had he but put half the resources he spent on constructing four Swamp Keeps into expanding his realm and hiring some serious freelance talent, he could've gotten big enough where I noticed him and felt compelled to eradicate all traces of him, his rule, his "nation" and his memory.


  OR, I could've just slapped his forces around in the military equivalent of "being too big to play with the other kids" and then offered him a job running one of my Destination Dungeons. That's what I usually do for minor leaguers who show some promise.


DESERT: I fucking hate deserts. On a personal level., that is. Professionally, once you've conquered all other terrains, you're sort of forced to go after some nomadic desert assholes because you have no one better left to subdue.


  But building anything out in a godforsaken sandpit it costlier than try to build something in a swamp. Water alone is critical and difficult to obtain in adequate amounts. As a man born of a properly forested, well rivered homeland, I can't logically understand why anyone would choose to live in a place where there wasn't a drink available every 30 feet.


  "Hey let's live in a tent all year and roam around a desert wasteland where being without better nation's number one resource will result in the death of your whole tribe. Yeah, that'll be fun for twenty generations. What do you mean you can 'grow' food?"


  Deserts. Just avoid em.



MOUNTAINS: Nothing like some impossibly huge, multi-turreted edifice carved out of the side of a fucking mountain to really give an enemy the willies. Who the hell has the  resources to pull that shit off, it begs the question.


  Well, you don't. Being a low level aspiring Dark Lord, you can't hack a sweet ass Doom Fortress into the side of the living earth. You're no where near the level where mountain-scaping becomes available to you. When you're just a pissant troublemaker, no offense intended, you're more likely to utilize a handy and obscure cave as your "Mountain Fasthold". You shan't be building anything on a mountain any time soon.


  Unless you're of the Dwarven persuasion of course, and then mountains is just what you're into.


  Hi-Ho, motherfucker.



JUNGLE: Don't have any other options, huh? Homeland it just one outrageously huge, steamy and lethal jungle. Well, good luck boyo. Everything living thing in the jungle is either trying to kill you or is plotting with every other adversity the jungle can offer to do you in. Not sure which I hate more, deserts or jungles. They both suck troll balls and you can have em.


  Honestly if I had to die in one or the other though, I'd take the desert. That way I could perish alone with my thoughts, not being slowly consumed while still alive by eight million ravenous insects. It's also worth noting that no Dark Lord worth mentioning has ever come from a jungle nation. There's just something about the crushing heat and humidity...and the fucking bugs....that makes one content with conquering a nearby nation or two.


  Had I been born in a godforsaken jungle, I would've booked passage to a better climate in whatever boat I could afford after stabbing my first victim.


  So, constructing fortresses in a jungle, yeah? You aren't gonna accomplish shit without an entire civilization at your disposal. Just the crews to cut back the relentlessly encroaching foliage on a daily basis would be crippling financially to someone without adequate slave labor or a solid cash flow and available work force.


  My advice is don't even attempt it until your resources are superior to the task at hand. Don't think to yourself " I believe I have enough subjugates, time for that first step pyramid", because you'll probably be wrong. Whatever numbers of workers you believe you need, double it if not triple.


  Fucktons of those workers are gonna die from a large variety of causes. WAY more than you think. Have you cleared ground to grow crops to feed your workforce? It's super fun in a jungle. Some people who weren't born in a jungle and have never been in a real one just assume that abundant food grows everywhere in the lush verdant bosom of Mother Jungle. I mean, just look at that lush canopy....


  What they don't realize is that they're wrong. It can sustain small populations. But to support enough bipeds to build you a thriving jungle kingdom, you're going to require a whole bunch of workable farmland. And the fucking jungle isn't giving that up without a fight. Then, once you've painstakingly cleared the land, you find that the soil is crap, which is ironic because of all the stubborn vegetation you had to repeatedly massacre just to get to the soil.


  Jungles. Find a better place to subdue.



Steppe: Steppe is a word which means 'frozen desert' in some language. I don't know which one, but somewhere, in the multiverse, it has to be. Steppe regions have two seasons, Permafrost and Summer Week. Why anyone would willingly live there if there are better regions to vanquish and colonize is beyond me. If you're idea of heaven is endless, sparse grassland with an occasional tiny hill to spark some excitement, then god bless ya for being so easily entertained. I prefer some landscape, so I took a bunch of it.


  That being said, it's no wonder why herds of small, pony-mounted, arrow-spewing bastards are exceptionally good at conquering other nations, they like to get away from their bleak homelands while the weather is good.


  So if you're going to construct some sort of Foreboding Edifice in a steppe region, don't get carried away. A really big yurt will do because no one is coming for your land and whatever your headquarters may be, they won't need to be defensible. No one wants 800 million acres of mostly frozen grassland except dudes who live very intimate lives with small, bad tempered and nearly indestructible ponies



Island: Islands come with a whole bunch of advantages and disadvantages. Really they're ideal for lower lever Dark Lords, but generally (sometimes based on the size of the island) they become more of a liability in the long run.


  It goes without saying that if you are an aspiring Island Dark Lord, then to conquer anything other than your own isle, your going to need a navy. Or an air force. But as discussed earlier in this blog, air forces substantial enough to actually allow you to overrun another nation are the province of the upper echelon of our trade, way out of your league, small timer. Best focus on a navy first, lad.


  Among the other disadvantages of an island stronghold are:


   -Difficult to grow/herd enough food to sustain a hearty population to feed your war machine.

  -Island paradise weather and hot, slender topless girls make going to war seem kinda pointless, therefore volunteers may be hard to come by.

  -As difficult it is for other powers to attack you, it is equally tough for you to attack them.

  -There's nowhere to run.

  -Island are notorious for volcanic acitvity, one day, your island may explode.

  -You are exceedingly vulnerable to Water-Mages. Which is embarrassing.





  I hope some low level ambitious scumbags will take heed of the advice posted above, free of charge I might add. My PR department is angry with me for not selling it in tome form, but I figure what the hel, right? Giving back to the community and whatnot.



  I look forward to challenges from those who benefit from my wisdom, it makes crushing them all the sweeter.



Yours in Conquest,
-Lord Hurderoth

Be Law His Word May
















*1 Unless you're an Elf, obviously.

  

Dark Lord specializations: what YOU need to know before checking that box. Or what variety of evil occupation best suits you?

  Dark Lord is just a generalized job description that may be applied to a wide range of malevolent trades, albeit only upon reaching a certain level within said trade. For instance you wouldn't call the kid who controls the lunch money in a seedy high school a Dark Lord, but he's clearly on the right path, we all have to start somewhere...


  In this regard Dark Lording is like the entertainment industry; it's incredibly easy to get into, yet extremely hard to be very successful in. Anyone can just run amok and slaughter other people, but only a true Dark Lord slaughters with purpose, slaying for an end game.


  There's no purpose in genocide if it doesn't net you some sweet resort land or enrich you in some other way. It's just a ton of bloodshed, logistical nightmares and arson for the sheer fuck of it.


  Senseless, yet oddly satisfying sometimes.


  As an authentic Dark Lord you must have a higher goal when you put a hamlet to the sword than just to test your new rustproofing compounds. Common thugs could do that by stabbing raccoons in the village midden.


  Your swordening of a a small population should be but a mere step on some grand, convoluted and above all EVIL plan to do something shitty to someone, somewhere because it's gonna make you money. Or secure some bitchin raw materials and/or slave labor. Etc etc.


  My point is that anyone can be a murderous, treacherous bastard, but only those who are extremely goal oriented, ambitious and far seeing will ever have a chance at earning the title of Dark Lord. Everyone else is just an alleyway knifeist.


  That being established, what kind of Dark Lord path should you choose? Sometimes it's not up to you, some are left with a legacy Lordness. But if you're not fortunate enough to have an oppressive despot for a Father who conveniently leaves you an Empire when you kill him, start planning early. Becoming a Warmage or a Necromancer ain't cheap. You'll be paying off student loans for decades unless you kill everyone you own money to. Which takes a lot of training. It's almost a catch-22.


  Here are some of the more common Dark Lord archetypes for you to peruse. In making your choice of career path, one must consider your strengths and play to them. If you're a hulking, loincloth bedecked warrior type, then becoming a Necromancer is probably not for you, you're too stupid for that. But a Barbarian King, now that could be right up your alley.


  Think about it, dipshit.





Dynastic Scion: You inherited your empire from a deceased relative, you didn't earn it. Now can you hold it? Expand it? Leave it to some offspring like a cherished family chariot?


  I got my start in Dark Lording when I murdered Pops in the study with a small bronze gargoyle that's been in the family for centuries. It was how he wanted to go. It was traditional. But then I pissed it all away when rival factions of my army annihilated each other in a highly localized civil war.


  I shrugged and walked to the nearest river village and started charging people if they wanted to use the river and beating them up when they refused to pay. It's a suck job but it gets you back in the game and keeps you on your toes. Those villagers can get vicious when they're thirsty...




Elected Official: Sometimes the People themselves choose their own oppressor. Sometimes it's even in a reasonably honest and mostly accurate election. An Elected Official has the trust of a majority of the people, and any one with a shred of common sense with a side order of guile can use that trust to oppress his constituents, while making them think it's in their best interests.


  This is the route to go if you don't like getting your hands dirty, so to speak.




Necromancer: You really like dead things. Maybe you were raised in a Gothic household and don't know any better, I don't know. Whatever the case may be, if the thought of raising dead, rotting things from the ground and having them steal shit and kill people in your name appeals to you, then you might wanna consider necromancy for an occupation.


  The great part about being and/or employing a necromancer is that the reanimated dead fight for free. They need no rest, food, kindness, sex, booze, loot, sense of purpose, encouragement, transport, recreation or reward. They're dead. They do what you/your necromancer says to do.


  The bad part is sometimes you/your hired necromancer fucks up and is consumed by demons and/or the living dead. If it's you that's the necromancer, then don't worry about it. Now you're dead too. But if you're a Dark Lord employing a necromancer, then you'd better have some Neutral clerics around to fend off your deceased necromancer's freed horde.



Horse Lord: The term "horse" is generous and conjures up fantastical images of large armored men astride thundering horses 20 hands high. But the reality is that your brutish little men ride incredibly hearty, shaggy little ponies; the Toyota Corolla of the steppes.


  Be that as it may, your mobile horde is the terror of the plains in any region flat enough to support tiny, nomadic people and their hairy-ass wee-bitty horses. Bear in mind that grazing land is as equally important as cities to sack when you go this road. Better to demand tribute from terrified cities rather than attempting to occupy them.


Unless your supply chain management team is top flight of course. Then you'll have adequate fodder when the grazing runs out.


 Duh.



War Mage: You're trained in combat sorcery, enough said. Most folk can only carry around the knowledge that they can destroy whole armies for so long before it gets to them. They start thinking thoughts like "I can incinerate a Troll battalion, why am I taking orders?" Or, "I really hate the guy I work for. I should blow up the mountain he lives on cuz I can do that kind of stuff."


  It's sorta inevitable. When one realizes they are more lethal than one's employer by several magnitudes, one tends to question why they aren't running the show rather than playing second lyre to some jumped up shitcrust who hates getting his boots wet in his opponents gore.


Bandit King/Pirate Lord: I don't recommend these paths at all. The life of a Bandit King/Pirate Lord may sound romantic and involve lots of whores, drinking and the best goddamn lean-to in the camp/cell in the ship, but ultimately you're nothing more than a Woods Bully/Wave Sissy that has every henchman snapping at your heels waiting for their chance to put a dagger in your guts and assume your mantle. Pest-ridden as it may be.



Cult Leader (Cleric): All religions are Bullshit, but in the context of fantasy roleplaying, these religious dicks can get quite powerful because their fake deities are real here and grant them spells and powers in exchange for buying into their sketchy origin stories.


Some folks unlock their inner power and confidence by believing that their strength comes from a Fairy DadBeard-Sky-Thing or Wispy-Tree-Planet-OmniSpirit. In the proper context they can be forces to be reckoned with. Depending on the world they inhabit they may be right or they may just be delusional egomaniacs who nevertheless manage great and terrible things based on the strength of their beliefs.



Barbarian King: Sure you're handy with a sword and too big to play with the other kids. But is that all you got? Depending on what kind of territory you're in, it might be enough. There are some lands so primitive and unstructured that every bully with a blade who rules more than 50 people calls himself a "King". This does not a Dark Lord make.


  It's a start. But if that's the extent of your qualifications, you'll never even make the Minor League, much less the bigs. Every successful Barbarian King I've ever known/defeated has had one or more of the following attributes in addition to the ability to kick everyone's ass with a sword.

-A talent for finding quality underlings whose skill sets complement and enhance their own

-A wholly instinctual competence in military tactics which blooms as their followers grow in number.

-A fun guy to hang out with. Everyone wants to party with him.

-An innovative approach to slaughter. Maybe they're no criminal mastermind, but they have a knack for inventing new weapons or tactics and perfecting them on their enemies.

-An uber-powerful magic fucking sword



Fallen Something: You started out good. I don't know what happened, but somehow, normally through a series of tribulations, you decided to go to the dark side. Like a corrupted Jedi, to mix my similes. This can happen to any class of Hero for any number of reasons. The bottom line is you began on the side of Light but then woke the fuck up and went for the Right. You figured out we have better drugs and pussy.


  Congratulations!




Pharaoh: Your forebears somehow convinced a whole nation of people that Pharaohs are part Gods and all Kings. It's a neat trick and obviously pays dividends. Your population of Bronze Age fuckwits actually believe that you make the sun rise each day, when in reality everyone knows that it's a giant dung beetle that pushes the sun across the sky until it is consumed nightly by a celestial Sky-Cow.


  But still, the control of a Pharaoh is possibly the most comprehensive of any Ruler Class. Your followers trip all over themselves doing your bidding even when it gets them killed. You promised them there'd be cake, virgins and mead and by golly they bought it hook, line and sinker.


  Well done, lad. Now go find a nation to conquer that has land capable of supporting a hearty population, has some sort of natural resources beyond river water, sand and crocodiles and then stop the practice of building pyramids. They don't do what you think they do unless you have the immense foresight to consider the tourist trade several millenia in the future.




  So there you go. There's 10 Dark Lord subclasses to give you something to chew on, you little dark pups. Worry those nipples!



-Stark Raving Lord Hurderoth


Word His Be Law