Monday, October 23, 2006

This is how my brain works

So for the Brythunian Age, my new D&D Basic/Expert campaign, I started work on my first dungeon. It's a haunted house type place overlooking a spooky lake. From the get-go I called the place the House of Mawdorn. To my ear that "awdor" really gives a place an ominous sound, like Macbeth's title, Thane of Cawdor. But for a couple days something about the word "mawdorn" was bugging me. Finally, it occured to me that I had swiped that name from somewhere else. Mawdorn is name of the god of shadows in the Judges Guild product The Unknown Gods. And while I intend to crib the deities from that excellent tome for my campaign, the House in question really doesn't have anything to do with any shadow-gods. So I decided to come up with a different name. I considered going with Cawdorn and working some Shakespeare into the House's background, but I rejected the name as giving too much away. So I settled on another name I also thought I had made up, the House of Maladorn. Given how well "making up" Mawdorn had worked out for me, I decided to google my new name. Turns out that Maladorn is the name of the man who built the Round Table. But I'm keeping Maladorn. I can work both the Arthurian and Shakespearean elements into the dungeon. And goblins. Lotsa creepy little goblins.

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