THE BLACKWYRM BARONY

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The Blackwyrm Barony is located in a narrow vale surrounded by bare woods and steep mountains: a grim, medieval borderland where civilization grasps to survive against those savage beings who dwell in the wilderness, and other nameless horrors which seldom crawls out of the forest to unleash dead and bane upon the helpless mortals. The region is especially famous for the Putrescent Vaults of Yoth (hex 0803), a vast and mostly unexplored mega-complex of underground halls and twisted corridors, supposedly the burial place of a mysterious, otherworldly race that left the planet eons ago. The House Blackwyrm rule over the Barony for thirteen generations, maintaining the status quo by means of brutal acts of repression. They rose to power when their ancestor, Eric Blackwyrm, slayed the dragon Smorg who had settled in the vale several years before, tyrannizing the inhabitants with incessant requests of sacrifices not to burn the whole place down to ashes. The words on their coat of arms say Debes Mihi Unum, "you owe me one", and none in the Barony ever questioned it.

Main Campaign Areas and Motives

• The Putrescent Vaults of Yoth are kind of a lovecraftian mega-dungeon, constructed by the Serpent-kin to hide from the upper world and populated by all kind of unspeakable horrors.
• Struggle against the tyranny of the House Blackwyrm by unearthing their terrible secret: the pact between Eric and the dragon Smorg, who faked his death in change of quiet and secret sacrifices and still lurks in his cave beneath the Devil's Pit (hex 0903). (Yes, the dragon's lair and the vaults may be loosely connected).
• The tomb of Eric Blackwyrm (hex 0905), possible location for The Tomb of Horrors.

Rules

• Most likely Labyrinth Lord
• Realms of Crawling Chaos
• Carcosa and Realm of Chaos mutation tables

SKILLS

I often wonder why D&D always failed in putting together a nice and elegant skill system, especially since the seeds for such system where present in the game since 1974. So I decided to extrapolate the skill system from the LBBs, and merge it to the BX edition (or Labyrinth Lord). You may find this simple little system to work perfectly with Swords & Wizardry, if the universal attribute modifiers house rule is used (see Ability Modifiers moreover).

Categories
There are six categories for skills:

• Breaking doors
• Listening at doors
• Locating mechanical traps
• Locating secret doors
• Hiding
• Surprise

As a general rule, characters succeed at a skill check with a 2 in 6 chance. Since the basic assumption of D&D when it comes to dice is that you better roll high, characters succeed in a skill check if they roll 5 or more on a six-sided die. (From here on, 5+.)

Racial Modifiers
The skill check is modified according to the character race:

• Elves get a +1 at Locating secret doors
• Dwarves get a +1 at Locating mechanical traps
• Halflings get a +1 at Hiding
• Humans get a -1 at Listening at doors

Armor Modifiers
The skill check is modified according the character's armor:

• Chain mail: -1 at Hiding and Surprise, +1 at Breaking Doors
• Plate mail: -2 at Hiding and Surprise, +2 at Breaking Doors

(Optional) Ability Modifiers
Every skill refers to a particular Ability and is modified accordingly:

• Breaking Doors: Strength
• Listening at doors: Wisdom
• Locating mechanical traps: Wisdom
• Locating secret doors: Intelligence
• Hiding: Wisdom
• Surprise: Dexterity