Mixing the Morg Borg Clones Together

There will be no posts for the next two weeks, as I am on holiday. In fact, I’m going to have to rush this second half to meet a deadline. Maybe revise it later.

Bit of an odd idea, but still a fun OSR concept. Ramming as many Mork Borg related settings as I possess/can acquire together and treating it like some big world hurtling towards the apocalypse.

Starting from a firm foundation, the MB-clone to spell the rules out and the only one I have in hard-copy, Pirate Borg. This and the somewhat anachronistic technology implicit in using CY_BORG, mean that the whole exercise will quickly devolve into a One Piece pastiche.

Islands are also useful as a way of throwing in random other modules. Just stick them on an island in the right location and the players can sail there. Assuming you can force them to stay and not take off the moment they think their lives will be in danger.

Pirate Borg: We immediately identify the core concept of the world: islands, pirates and creeping horror. We have an archipelago where several major hostile nations have set up export industries and the lawless rogues who prey on shipping. With the ruins of Atlantis and various portals to the underworld scattered about, producing playable monsters.

We don’t want this to just be a pastiche of real-life, not least because Pirate Boprg has committed the progressive sin far more regressive games have done and completely removed any Native America/First Nation people to avoid questions about the origin of said setting.

Let’s spread the islands about. There are many archipelagos along the equator, just full of pirates of varying stripes and several mutually hostile large states. Kingdoms far away to colonize and create the ungoverned frontier that pirates and outlaws emerge from.

Brethren of the Coast (Republic of Pirates) – They want booty and grog and aren’t too picky on how they get it. The open sea promises freedom, but each ship is a little state of its own.

We have The Company (West India Co.) – Given a free reign but focused soley on meeting quotas and payments.

The Unstable Colonies (The French Indies) – A network of ports half decadent and half wilderness, entirely self-interested but are just as likely to turn on you as part of some revolutionary or conspiratorial web as they are to sell you what you need.

The Authorities (Viceroyalty of New Spain) – The oldest, largest and most stringent. They want to gobble up the islands, ship the wealth home and obtain the land and souls of the people to add to their great imperial machine.

The cultists (The Wretched) – They are here to preach to end of the world and do slimy sea and tentacle things in secret. They probably have contacts with the merfolk.

The Wild Islands (The Dark Yucatan) – No one lives here (especially native people who aren’t cultists). Islands which are cursed or otherwise some awful that the only reason to go is the rumors of treasure unclaimed because no one could retrieve it.

Merfolka and Aquatic Mutants mean there must be undersea kingdom (or just one)

 

While there are two locations (even two types of playable sea-creature), the easiest way to set up an initial spread of islands is to just randomly roll them and apply one of the two themes from each faction’s writeup if there are any people there.

 

Down Among the Dead Men has a great idea in being able to visit Davy Jone’s Locker (despite Pirate borg making Jones a giant turtle). If you want to go anywhere in the world fast, you can sail into one of several maelstrom that make up the center of each of the world’s archipelagos (Mork Borg setting). If your ship is prepared correctly, however that may be (hull plated with Obols, right incarnations etc). You can sail right on through so long as you don’t fall in or get off, then you are stuck. This might be how all the knowledge about raising the undead and the subsequent problems got out.

 

Ronin: There’s an archipelago, with an isolationist government just as awful as any of the major powers of the sea. The maelstrom has started to block out the sun and the demons and undead roam. Anyone who does not feel their duty to stay is boarding smuggler ships docked in secret and taking to life on the high seas.

While you could just use the Ronin map of Kage no Shima. A surrounding shoal of lesser islands can be generated normally with the Pirate Borg tables then populated via the Ronin tables. There are probably dozens of island colonies that have been influenced or settled by people or monsters from Kage no Shima.  Enough that no one bats an eye at a warrior wielding two or more long curved swords.

 

Smork Borg: Two islands, the Smork Poles mark the edges of East and West.

The western island is decently sized but carries a curse. Anyone who lands uninvited shrinks down to the size of a Smork, and only by the grace and financial motivation of the resident Smorks will they change back.

The eastern island is a normal-sized island populated by human-sized Smorks. Just they sit next to an island realm of careless giants. So for all intents and purposes, visitors are the size of Smorks anyway.

 

Orc Borg: The sound is what is noticed first, a great scream across the water and the wind. Upon the horizon is an enormous metallic leviathan, eternally charging forth. Populated by crude yet cunning monster-men, the Hulk eternally plows across the oceans of the world. Usually, hellbent on passing through a Maelstrom, for which the Orcs fear not. Sometimes it hits an island and if it doesn’t wreck itself, the Orcs pour out to pillage scrap and food. When the Hulk finally sinks, it is said the Orcs wreak havoc in Davy’s Jone’s Locker before returning again. But what is suspected is there is a hidden junkyard island they all sail from.

Frontier Scum: There are two continents, an old world shrouded by misty islands and a new world, a spiraling archipelago surrounding a mostly desolate center. Directly opposite across the tropical island belt is this land. Lawless and corrupt, passage is by train, horse and riverboat. With the grandest riverboats fitting themselves with massive paddles for blue-water piracy and staff by the most sharp-eyed gunslingers and desperados. They hold themselves in smug superiority over the cutlass-wearing lot, for they have better guns than anyone else.

CY_BORG: In the heart of the New World is a radiation-soaked desert and in the heart of that desert. Connected by a single polluted inlet and blacktop that becomes rail and rutted track. The City beats a sick and black heart for all power emerges from it, all commerce and vice is drawn to it and all technology on those isolated Tech-Isles ultimately is granted by it.

To the rest of the world the city is more than just vice, it is sickness and freedom from a life 3 to 5 centuries behind it. Alkl the Ash and other weird drugs, concoctions and extracts flows into it for the people always need more. And in the heart of the city stands some towers.

CORP BORG: And in those towers sit the ancient old men who manage the world. They do not care for politics or humanity, but about the smooth progress of commerce and authority. Theoretically there should be one old man for each archipelago or slice of the continents. But no one quite knows how many, except there are at least 3 and no more than 9, always odd (for quorum). The apocalypse is a blip, something that has happened in different places and will happen again. Unless it’s not and everything is spiraling out of control. And below them sit the hapless and feuding bureaucracy, the companies and demons who grease the wheels of civilization so it can remain functional and prosperous (for those who rate a mention).

Nations send representatives and compete fiercely to get someone appointed. Being judged on their wealth, their security and their quality of culture (for those who deserve it).

Black Powder & Brimstone: The old world is a mess; nations war under strange influences and sent many refugees and deserters into the seas to try their hand anywhere else. Expect nothing but horrible stories and steely-eyed captains. Aesthetic remains on point though and concoctions found there make their way into the warped hands of pirates.

Star Borg: The archipelago surrounding the New World is heavily influenced by the medley of cultures which have made it’s way to it. Mystic traditions, metal ships and cosmic weaponry make for a potent mix. The Empire of the archipelago has overthrown the shining beacon of the New World and fighting rage through it. Expect normalized weirdness wherever you put in for port, and a sort of lackadaisy approach to live. Go with the Flow. Say nothing about the strange lights in the sky.

Mork Borg in general: Whether on the continent of the Old World or in the misty seas around it. Random coast and islands of protruding rock and pines play host to a bewildering array of dismal disasters. Where the End of the World draws nearer. Stick random adventure on island anywhere in the northern hemisphere or on the mainland if you want the players to walk or ride.