Work on the Alexandrian has been light of late because I’ve been toiling to wrap up a major project.

The big hitch-up at the moment has been layout. Unfortunately, I’ve discovered that Windows 7 won’t run the version of Quark I own, which means I needed to upgrade to a new layout program. After examining the available options, I decided to switch to Adobe inDesign.

While in many ways I’m glad I’ve made the switch, the fact that I’m basically needing to relearn layout from the ground up is definitely complicating the completion of this project. (Which is already far behind schedule.) Things are just similar enough to be confusing. It’s easy to see why lots of people and organizations choose to stick with what they know because it’s what they know.

But if all goes well, I should have a major announcement coming down the pike in the next few days. And starting later today I’ll be posting some of my older professional work to fill the gap.

Dragon winds are hot, dry winds which blow suddenly, strongly, and unexpectedly against the prevailing winds. They are taken to be signs of ill-omen and bad fortune. In the Low Countries they are more explicitly called dragon’s breath, and perhaps that’s why, in the crag villages of the Killorn Peaks, they are believed to be the sulfurous breath of the Red Maiden, the most-feared of the eighty-seven fates.

Loremasters, however, trace the origin of the term back to the tribute flights of the tyrant dragon Cinderheart. It is written that he possessed wings of crawling magma and that the terrible heat swept forth by the beating of those wings could be felt for miles as a harbinger of terror.

It’s interesting watching PCs (and their players) slip through a varying appreciation of cash. The same folks who will cheer at a 100 gp payout at 1st level will gradually become far more jaded towards their bank accounts as the levels tick past.

“I’ve only got 2,000 gp!”

Ah, yes. You poor dear. You’ve only got as much money as the average person makes in two lifetimes.

Of course, this might all be funnier if it didn’t happen in real life and with real money all the time.

In the Middle Ages, the wealthy were known to sponsor holy pilgrims. Like modern millionaires funding a NASCAR team, the sponsors would share in the reflected glory of the pilgrimage. Of course, as in all matters of salvation and piety, there were also deeper spiritual entanglements to consider in such things: Acting in their name and as their agents, the pilgrims would receive blessing not only for themselves but for the lords and ladies in whose name they journeyed.

Historically speaking, the sponsoring of pilgrimages were partly a matter of holy duty (like any other form of tithing) and partly a matter of expediency (for those too busy to make the journey for themselves). In a fantasy setting, however, it would be fairly easy to imagine a third parameter: Danger.

Enter the adventurers.

Imagine, for example, an ancient holy site which is now located in the upper lairs of the Bloodreaver Dragons. Or in the Lava Caverns of the Myrmarch. Or lost in the eddies of the Astral Sea.

And in a world where the gods are active (and perhaps even malevolent) forces, the stakes for successfully performing such pilgrimages might be incredibly high. Thus those who have proven that they can make the greatest dangers into their play-things could easily find great profit in performing such journeys.

A sponsored pilgrimage could be a fun, exploratory travelogue (an appropriate sub-structure for any hexcrawl); it could be tied into a larger scenario (“we need guidance from the Forgotten God of the Purple Seas, and you must journey to his Broken Temple lost among the Steppes of the Black Wight”); or it could be the seed for even larger adventures (“we went to Thor’s shrine for you, but now we all seem to be having visions of Ragnarok”).

Found a great word the other day: Scurrier.

It’s an old term referring to “one sent out to reconnoiter or scout”. It originally seems to have applied specifically to military scouts (who would be sent out to “scour” the countryside), but in the 16th century it seems to have migrated into more domestic concerns as a sort of “special agent” before abruptly disappearing from the language.

I just love the archaic tang of it. It makes it sound like the perfect job for a group of PCs: Whether exploring a vast wilderness; investigating extraordinary crimes; acting as agents in a foreign land; or any number of other activities.

It could also be readily applied to any number of modern milieus as well: Scurriers of the Knight Templars emerging from the hidden sanctuaries to pursue the Order’s agendas in the 21st century. Or perhaps agents of an ancient order which has charged itself with scourging the planet of the vampiric plague.

What about applying it as a bit of cyberpunk slang referring to the ‘runners who scout out the digital frontiers?

Once you start looking, it seems like there’s no place you won’t find scurriers scurrying.