Has anyone ever done DEATHWORLD as the setting for a game?

[diehard]

A decent Burroughs novel, but if you want to read the best of his stuff then it's the Mars Trilogy, Princess, Gods and the Warlord of Mars. The "At the Earth's Core" books were pretty decent too.

[Cacique Caribe]

Yes.  Pellucidar is definitely a brutal land.

Dan
PS.  I’ll make it there one day:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/9593487@N07/albums/72157705635591075

[AKULA]

I’ve thought about Deathworld as a setting, but never actually got around to it

Funnily enough, it popped back onto my “maybe” list the other day as I’m already making some jungle bases for an mesoamerican fantasy game.

[Daeothar]

Well I took a few minutes last night to check the Catachan codex, but regrettably, the mentioned reactive terrain is not in there. I do have some vague recollection of something akin to it, so my guess is they're in a White Dwarf and/or Chapter Approved article.

Must check those too then...

[Cacique Caribe]

Someone refresh me again … what’s the premise behind the Catachan world?  Thanks.

Dan

[Daeothar]

Basically the entire premise of the Deathworld book... 

The entire world with its flora and fauna is out to kill its human settlers. Which results in a very hardy stock of humans.

[Silent Invader]

Interesting thread.

I’ve yet to find a setting for my Sci-fi project and ‘reactive terrain’ sounds ideal) especially for solo games.

[Cacique Caribe]

Basically the entire premise of the Deathworld book... 

LOL.  What a fortuitous “coincidence”! 

Dan

[3Fingers2]

Think I had deathworld 2 once ? He crash lands on an planet that’s bit tech backward , gets enslaved and has to wander a desert or arid countryside looking for a green shoot which you have to dig up ? He attacks the gang leader and goes looking for someone they barter with and gets captured again ? Can’t remember the rest apart from some people come looking for him and a wash he befriends gets taking with them ?

[Daeothar]

...I would really like to know of the references to the other scifi originals you're speaking of.  If you remember any others, please post it!

40K is, by origin, the penultimate amalgam of a wide range of scifi and fantasy books, settings and what have you. There are way too many to simply list. Some are only oblique references, others are homages or even unashamed rip-offs. This has been evident since the Rogue Trader book that started it all.

To name but a few: the Emperor, the navigator gene and -houses were solidly based on Dune. Catachans  are US marines in Vietnam (in space). They even have a special character called Sly Marbo; I'll let you fill in that reference yourself

Imperial Terra has definite similarities with Trantor from the Foundation series (and some aspects of the Emperor and terran bureaucracy and organisation got clues from it as well). Tyranids/Genestealers obviously are a direct nod to the Aliens franchise, and Arbites are 2000AD Judges in 40K.

The fall of the legions during the Horus Heresy, with Horus as the greatest of the Emperor's sons is analogue to the fall from grace of Lucifer in the bible. Also; all legions/chapters are based on some aspect of mythology or historical culture.

Space Marines were of course also heavily influenced by Heinlein's Starship Troopers.

And there are thousands more; just open up any codex, rulebook or novel and you'll be innundated with nods, references and appropriations.

Sometimes you'll recognize them because you know the material that inspirated the writers, and other times, you unexpectedly get educated on some link that you never knew existed (like me in this thread, with this Deathworld reference)

I always find it fun to spot the references, and except some truly blatant, in-your-face rip-offs, they usually fit into the overall narrative pretty well; it's one of the charms of 40K to me, to be honest...

[FreakyFenton]

Interesting recomendation!

[Cacique Caribe]

A description of the planet, from the novel itself:

"Mankind doesn't belong on Pyrrus—yet has been there for almost three hundred years now. The age expectancy of my people is sixteen years. Of course most adults live beyond that, but the high child mortality brings the average down. … It is everything that a humanoid world should not be. The gravity is nearly twice Earth normal. The temperature can vary daily from arctic to tropic. The climate—well you have to experience it to believe it. Like nothing you've seen anywhere else in the galaxy."

"The planet has an axial tilt of almost forty-two degrees, so there is a tremendous change in temperature from season to season. This is one of the prime causes of a constantly changing icecap. The weather generated by this is spectacular to say the least."

"That's not all—it's barely the beginning. The open seas perform the dual destructive function of supplying water vapor to keep the weather going, and building up gigantic tides. Pyrrus' two satellites, Samas and Bessos, combine at times to pull the oceans up into thirty meter tides. And until you've seen one of these tides lap over into an active volcano you've seen nothing.”

"Heavy elements are what brought us to Pyrrus—and these same elements keep the planet at a volcanic boil. There have been at least thirteen super-novas in the immediate stellar neighborhood. Heavy elements can be found on most of their planets of course—as well as completely unbreathable atmospheres. Long-term mining and exploitation can't be done by anything but a self-sustaining colony. Which meant Pyrrus. Where the radioactive elements are locked in the planetary core, surrounded by a shell of lighter ones. While this allows for the atmosphere men need, it also provides unceasing volcanic activity as the molten plasma forces its way to the surface."

For the first time Jason was silent. Trying to imagine what life could be like on a planet constantly at war with itself.

"I've saved the best for last," Kerk said with grim humor. "Now that you have an idea of what the environment is like—think of the kind of life forms that would populate it. I doubt if there is one off-world species that would live a minute. Plants and animals on Pyrrus are tough. They fight the world and they fight each other. Hundreds of thousands of years of genetic weeding-out have produced things that would give even an electronic brain nightmares. Armor-plated, poisonous, claw-tipped and fanged-mouthed. That describes everything that walks, flaps or just sits and grows. Ever see a plant with teeth—that bite? I don't think you want to. You'd have to be on Pyrrus and that means you would be dead within seconds of leaving the ship. Even I'll have to take a refresher course before I'll be able to go outside the landing buildings. The unending war for survival keeps the life forms competing and changing. Death is simple, but the ways of dealing it too numerous to list."

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/28346/28346-h/28346-h.htm

Dan

[Spinal Tap]

Three of my favourite Sci fi novels, Deathworld  2 and 3 have totally different flavours to the original while keeping the primary characters.
Deathworld 3 would make a great Sci fi meets low fantasy setting I reckon.

Harry Harrison's Stainless Steel Rat stories are a good read too, much more tongue in cheek though.

[Cacique Caribe]

Deathworld 3 would make a great Sci fi meets low fantasy setting I reckon.

Is that the one with gangs fighting over little strips of beach?  Or is that #2?

Dan

[Spinal Tap]

Is that the one with gangs fighting over little strips of beach?  Or is that #2?

Dan

2 is the one where Jason travels along the beach at the start, 3 is a world a little like Mongolia and a Ghengis Khan like warlord.