#212 Sat (1/21/23) - Into the Odd - the mudmarine [OW]

 Mike is developing a RPG game scenario/setting called Into The Odd.  It has elements from China Mieville, Ultraviolet Grasslands and Gene Wolfe.  It features weird and surreal environments and encounters.

One aspect of the gameplay is Expeditions into The Underground, which feels a bit like Stalker/Roadside Picnic by Brothers Stugatsky.  There are unique Artifacts in The Underground.  In Neal Asher's The Technician, there is a prospector-creature who is part frog and rides around in an Mudmarine (amphibious) vehicle.

I propose something like a hybrid steam-powered Expedition rig called the Stoheim-Mannlicher Autonomous Reticulated Tractor. It would look a bit like a crab or spider from the front and have 4 articulated limbs that can be affixed with different appendages such as scythe, cutters, grabbers, stantions, paddles, or even flamethrowing torches. Behind the cab and engine box, there is a long tubelike articulated loaf, something like a Conastoga wagon train, but made with overlapping chitonous plates, something like the bugs in Nausicaa. It seems from the outside to be something like a beetle blended with a WW1 tank, dragging an elongated, armored eggsack. 

Inside the armored sack (about 35-50 feet long) is room for the passengers and cargo. Most of the cargo is supported in hammocks that are strung inside the carrier and the entire device slides on a series of interlocked sleds with runners.  Because of the design, the Train should simply slide through tight areas following behind the Motivator. There are also small treaded units that provide additional propulsion through mud or dense undergrowth.  It is designed mainly for jungle, savannah, tidal, desert, or swamp exploration.  It would not perform particularly well underground or in caverns, or mountains, or rough, rocky terrain.

There is a crew of explorers led by Dr. Alonzo Silvestri, a man of unquestionable talent in the fields of anatomy and biology, by afflicted with some peculiarities, and one might even say obsessions, when it comes to cryptozoology. The Tractor (it would have to have a name painted on the bonnet like a WW2 bomber) is operated by Dimitri Yourcenarian, an Armenian engineer and mechanic with an eyepatch and a tale to tell.  Other members of the company include:

Armin Lowenstein - crack shot with a telescoped rifle and handy with a map, but saddled with a tendency toward German Romanticist poetry.


 

 

 


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