View over the Milieu 16 – Averoigne

The haunted, werewolf-ridden, sorcerous forested hills of this imagined French province await in this episode of View over the Milieu – Clark Ashton Smith’s Averoigne.

oh [Music] this series is all about universes multiverses planets worlds continents and cities we’re delving not into specific games but into the myu created for them we’ll be looking at where these settings came from their major features and why you should consider them for your own gaming experiences from 1930 to 1951 Clark Ashton Smith wrote a series of tales predominantly published in the pages of weird tales about a fictionalized province of France and a variety of strange occurrences there dating from the medieval to the Renaissance and Beyond other writers have also set their Works in that very same Province as example by the 2019 anthology of short stores titled the avaro Legacy which does give the game away with respect to the subject of today’s view over the binu for it is indeed avarin one of Smith’s Masterworks and within gaming a major influence on the 1981 Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Castle Amber in avoin the enchantress weaves weird spells that call a changeling sun and with it a merry band as we examine the region from its werewolf haunted forests to the blackped Cathedral of its capital Clark Ashton Smith was one of a trinity of authors that regularly contributed to the pages of weird Tales Magazine the other two being Robert E Howard of Conan Fame and HB Lovecraft he of the nihilistic cudu Mythos Smith’s writing Echoes both of these at times but is of a unique color that allows his characters to feel as well as Adventure contrast Gaspard dunard one of Smith’s most famous avoin characters with Conan Solomon Caine or Charles Dexter Ward and at least for me a more multi-dimension figure leaps from the page I guess that sets my wees out in so far as much as all three sit prominently in my fiction collection it is Smith who Rises to the top as for avaro itself it is often easy to forget that it is entirely fictional it can be compared back to ol and certainly many of that province’s features from the black Cathedral of clor frand echoing aaro’s Von to the forest of thron echoing Smith’s description of of the dense Woodlands of his creation even the two counterparts being founded by GIC tribes the Avery or Al and the avaron for aaro has a seeming connection but while it is true that a trip to Al can bring some visuals from avarin to life we must still treat it as its own thing avaro never existed it is a Fantastical depiction of an imaginary France and an attempting to layer the various maps and descriptions of the place onto those of real world origin is a task doomed to produce unsatisfying results in some measure the avarin cannon comprises 13 stories by Smith and a further six stories that exist only in outline form to this we may add a plethora of other authors who have added their narrative skills to aoyan including HP Lovecraft Simon White Chapel and Ron hilga the latter having rounded out some of Smith’s uncompleted fragments into full Tales the stories in this extended Cannon are scattered across centuries of history and some even transcend time itself the story form is usually one of character Focus often of firstperson narration recounting some strange happen stuns in which that character has found himself from Gaspar dord to Gerard LOM to Luc de Shier to Sephora the enchantress and azarak the bishop of jubia practices the tales of these wonderful literary Creations when set against the forboding darkness of ain’s impenetrable woods and ruins is what captivates me and keeps me coming back to visit relatively frequently with the publication in 1981 of dungeon module X2 Castle Amber Smith’s avarin finally made it into game form although the module draws from more than Smith’s work for inspiration the entirety of a key part of the adventure has the player characters chasing around avoin meeting key figures from Smith stories and even participating in scenes from those very Tales I do have some issues with the map of avoin included in a module however within its 12 m per hex scale this makes the province’s length north to south approximately the same distance as separated Paris from Monaco around the 450 mile Mark give or take a handful of tens of miles at that Dimension the place would cover more than 2/3 of France a size that is reflected neither in Smith’s Works nor within the context of the adventure the Goodman games Original Adventures reincarnated version of the work repeats this anomaly reducing the hex scale to five or six miles improves this generally speaking there are two maps of avarin to consider the one presented in Castle Amber and one drawn by Tim Kirk the castle Amber map other than than its scale draws from the general north south elongated shape of Alver itself while Kirk’s map is somewhat uh lore and to itself in either case the relative positions of the various sites described in Smith stories is fine if we again ignore the scale anomaly away from Dungeons and Dragons avoin lives within the cthulu Mythos as previously noted Smith and Lovecraft corresponded and exchanged ideas and elements of each other’s writings appear in various Works Smith created saua for his hyperborean cycle a figure Lovecraft later used in the Whisperer in darkness this Lovecraft in link and the similar tones in certain cases within the works of Smith and Lovecraft had fled um to avarin and other Smith Creations being considered part of the Mythos indeed the encyclopedia kuliana has this to say about the place South Central French province more commonly known as Al and considered to be the most witch ridden in the entire country the anals of Flavia Alesia states that the land was settled in the time of the Gauls by the avaron a people who originally dwelt in a western land which sank beneath the ocean during the Roman period the towns of sasis and AUM later known as zes and vion respectively were greatly feared due to the presence of Cults dedicated to a god called sedoka the church attempted to suppress this worship but by the 11th century many highly placed churchmen of the region had taken up these older practices and little could be done undoubtedly the most famous inhabitant of aoin was Gaspar dor de Von a reputed wizard who translated the book of ibon into Norman French in the 13th or 14th century this volume when put into such an accessible form resulted in a Resurgence of sorcery in the region that never quite came to an end this is of course a fictionalized entry and as we have noted the connection between avarin and Alver is far from definitive avarin continues to be a realm of Fascination for readers of Pulp fantasy and weird fiction and sits in the hearts of many role players thanks to its connection to the Cudo Mythos and the worlds of Dungeons and Dragons avarin has many layers to it that can be drawn into role playing the underlying foundation of the galak cavaron with their potential ties back to hiboria Atlantis and other sunken lands coupled with the Roman incursion and later medieval layers giving a rich texture to the soil the supernatural elements Go in all manner of directions from black sorcery to visceral werewolf encounters magic and older Pagan beliefs intimate mingle and compete with the church and through figures such as AAC the church is not some Bastion of goodness and sanctuary in every place here the province can be used for a multitude of time periods from GAC through to Renaissance and Beyond and This lends itself and has done so to plays on time travel and time displacement the land is of a beautiful but forboding nature heavily forest with trees harboring dark tales for those you that are familiar with barovia and the menacing castle ravenloft that entire landscape would not feel too out of place within avarin even though its influence lies obviously more to the Balkans of Dracula Fame even the cities are evocative the scene of Gaspar dord rushing through Von to take on the cathedral for his confrontation with the Colossus of yulon is amongst the most memorable in my fantasy reading with Smith able to bring such things from the page with yet an economy of words as a game setting avoin can be made to live and breathe and it is a great example of a Points of Light style of myu the towns and Villages are connected by a network of roads and trails that while not exactly safe are at least safer than traping through the Wilderness areas replete with myth Legend threat and danger I would not say it is for folks that enjoy a more High fantasy form of role playing if corrupted priests dark necromancers and Sorcerers Haunted Woods dark Fay and catho esque Cults are your bag then aoin absolutely is something that you should look up it is relatively compact but thick with atmosphere and many of its characters rival more well-known figures such as gandal fafard in the grey Mouser or Conan for color I love the place although I wouldn’t want to visit without packing plenty of silvered weapons first