fragments of a blue ruin
I was asked recently about monster stat blocks and how I come up with them. I thought we should take a brief tour of the anatomy of a Vaarn monster, dig around in their metaphorical guts, and learn what all their numbers and stats are telling us. Hopefully you will arrive at a clearer understanding… Continue reading ANATOMY OF A MONSTER
They were made to be devoured, a divine gift from GAEA to Her charges. Each adult weighs more than two men, the flanks beneath their soft white skin laden with fat. Their eyes and ears are weak, their legs likewise. They were never intended to run. Within the pliant confines of their frames, twinned… Continue reading FEASTBEAST
I'm back for a sixth dose of Monsters in the Machine. To re-read our previous entry click here, or you can go back to the start and see how it all began. To quickly re-cap what's going on, this is a follow-up to an earlier creative session, where I feed an AI entries from the Vaults… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE 6: RE-RETRIBUTION
I couldn't stay away. Monsters in the Machine returns for a fifth installment. This is roughly the time that most franchises begin to go completely off the rails. Anyone who was involved with the original movie has long-since quit, and they're starting to get a bit desperate with the plot twists. Maybe the serial killer… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE 5: REVENGEANCE
I'm back for another episode in my ongoing duel/duet with the OpenAI. I riff from it, it learns from me, and together we build something that neither of us could achieve alone. Also I prove conclusively that I'm the better writer and more creative. Anyway, bring on the monsters! Blightbeast Biological / SyntheticHD: 10, Armour:… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE 4: HUMAN AFTER ALL
Last time on Monsters in the Machine, our beloved human author struck back against the tyrannical AI, improving upon its work and sculpting new Vaarnish monsters from the raw material created by the robot. Although cowed, the AI was not defeated. Today it returns to the driver's seat, generating fresh new monster stat blocks prompted… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE 3: REVENGE OF THE MACHINE
Earlier this month I conducted an experiment with machine learning. Could OpenAI, when fed prompts taken from the Vaarn Bestiary, create convincing and interesting Vaarnish monsters? The answer seemed to be a cautious 'yes'. The natural language AI did create some interesting new creatures, including psychic lunar beasts, void-swimming sharks, and a really horrible limb-grafting… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE 2: HUMANITY RESTORED
They are the inheritors of one of mankind’s oldest and fondest wishes: that we might join the birds we envy and fly with them in the unbounded vastness of the depths above. In leaving the ground they have lost none of their ancestors’ pride or taste for blood and the creatures are famed for their… Continue reading OF THE WALL’S HARPIES
It's no secret that I'm interested in machine learning, and the Vaarn setting not only features sentient AI, but is partly authored by procedural algorithms. I use Markov text generators to create most of the names I've used in the setting, and the surreal, dreamlike artwork I frequently feature on this blog (including the featured… Continue reading MONSTERS IN THE MACHINE
You are watched, by kindly eyes in the dark. Your imperfections are invitations, each blemish an opportunity for the observer to prove their love. Although they do not know you, they love you as they would a newborn child, and each cut or bruise you receive hurts the watcher as though the injury was to… Continue reading COSSETING CHRYSALID
VAULTS OF VAARN 