The moon has played an exceptionally important role in the development of the human imagination. The sun gives life; we know this intuitively, and we have long worshipped it as a result. But the moon is different. It stands there in the heavens and seems to suggest to us that our world, the human world, and the sun that gives it warmth and light, are not all that exists in creation. It calls for an explanation. It seems to have its own, cold and pale, source of light. It presents us with mysteries, at times concealing its face and at times revealing it, and sometimes looming larger or even changing its colour. Looking at it carefully, one can discern features on it, which to some cultures resembles a face, to others a rabbit, to others a woman carrying sticks. It is trite to call it 'otherworldly', but that is how even the ancients seem to have thought of it. Is it possible to imagine that human beings would have come up with science fiction if the moon did not exist?
To the hardened SF enthusiast, the moon is old hat; we have even been there. But in a fantasy, or apocalyptic, or 'dying earth' setting, the moon can be anything. Anything can live there; any rules of physics can apply; its pale white surface could conceal any kind of structure or environment one would wish. I have long had the idea of a megadungeon setting called The Mountain to the Moon, but other broad options suggest themselves:
1 - The Alternate History Moon Invasion campaign setting, in which one picks a time period and location (the Thirty Years' War; pre-colonial Australia; Viking Greenland; Great Zimbabwe) and imagines that the inhabitants of the moon (who might be strange humans, aliens, monsters, slumbering gods, whatever) have recently made their appearance on Earth.
2 - The Voyage to the Moon campaign setting, in which one imagines a journey to the moon taking place at a much earlier point in history than it did in reality, perhaps through discovery of the phlogiston or suchlike; perhaps the voyagers are early moderns, or ancient Greeks, or Incas.
3 - The Dying Earth, Living Moon campaign setting, in which life on Earth itself has become exhausted and civilisation frayed, and in which the moon has been chosen by the wealthy and powerful as a place to hide from the coming apocalypse.
4 - The Dying Earth, Dying Moon campaign setting (into which category the Mountain to the Moon falls), wherein an ancient civilisation found a way to colonise the moon from Earth, but then fell into irreversible decline and ruin - and now the comparatively degenerate inhabitants of Earth can attempt to ascend to the moon to explore those ruins, recover treasures, and so on.
Suggest your own variations on these themes, or your own themes, in the comments. Let us return the moon to its rightful place at the centre of the human imagination!
The moon is a failsafe backup that has accidentally had its memory wiped. It's supposed to match Earth's current atmospheric composition, hydrosphere percentage, tectonic structure, density, etc., so that if some sudden disaster renders Earth uninhabitable its general conditions can be "re-downloaded" from last save. Unfortunately, something has gone wrong and the moon is in "blank" mode. The changes to Earth have not been saved. We should find a way to restore the moon to function so we have that failsafe backup. That creeping feeling of mild dread you experience when you haven't saved the file you've been working hard on to several external devices? That is what life on Earth should be feeling.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like it could be an Adam Roberts novel.
DeleteThe moon is green. They say there are people up there, but how can that be? Skyships belong to the Outsiders, and the Outsiders don’t like people.
ReplyDeleteNow that you mention the moon being green I quite liked the Dragonlance idea of having the different coloured moons having alignment-related significance
DeleteMoon as physical god, provider of the spark of chaos that fuels dreams, compells madmen, and gives heros their visions of a better future. Mostly accessible in dreamscapes, but also a literal giant dude/lady who can be visited/poked/killed/courted. Necessary for the continuation of sentient life, but not intrinsically friendly to her children.
ReplyDeleteThat's the model I used in the recent game jam for a FIST mission (80s paranormal mercenary action) centered on moon missions but should be compatible with most fantasy settings. https://e5burrito.itch.io/lunar-luluby
Vaguely reminds me of the dead god in Planescape who floats around... Can't now remember the name, though!
DeleteMy EPT inspired science-fantasy campaign has a Fortress Moon, a moon obviously inhabited and fortified by others (obvious to anyone with a minimally functional telescope) ... whenever my players get there, I was going to introduce reduced gravity, 30-day light/dark cycles, and thin atmosphere as elements to challenge the "norms" of the game, aside from the fantastic people and creatures they might meet there. Simple, perhaps, but I'm excited at the chance to introduce some "hard sci-fi" elements of reduced gravity into my science fantasy game
ReplyDeleteI like that idea.
DeleteIn a book I wanted to write in my youth, the moon was the opening of the bottle in which the whole earth was kept as a treasure.
ReplyDeleteTell us more.
DeleteIn Vance's Planet of Adventure, corpses of the good or evil are flung by catapult towards the moon Az or the moon Braz. The moon as afterlife suggests a reason to go there to rescue a dead comrade, as well as a new venue for play if the entire party is killed.
ReplyDeleteYES. Sold.
DeleteThe moon is a superweapon.
ReplyDeleteWell, the payload of a hypercatapult superweapon.
Did you notice, oh traveler from our own Earth, that this particular moon, so so much like our own, goes from FULL to NEW overnight? Like someone hit a lightswitch?
You probably thought you had lost count of its waning, all the rest of the world being equally sideways, and you without electricity.
No! They launched it at a distant target, and the glowing projectile takes a full 29.5 days to regenerate.
Primary antagonist : Flumphs. You thought they were silly and nice, these Lovecraftian lawfulgood acid-luffas. But what are they doing underground right next to those Mind Flayers anyway?
They are playing Battleship against a distant star system. The flumphs themselves retain their usual Disney sidekick aspect, but each cloister's job is to pull the psychic restraining rope just so in order that the moon missile hits the desired coordinates. To that end, their chieftains are called archimandrites for a more exotic feel and have abraded away such squishy labels as "Lawful" or "Good" on the sandpaper of their larger purpose to at all costs run their particular piece of the war machine.
Secondary antagonists: Lizardmen from another star system. They aren't really lizard men after all but take their form in order to act as saboteurs against the dread catapult. They might enlist your assistance.
Heh, I once ran a loose campaign where flumphs were the accidental default antagonists (well, one of three factions sharing the role). They were trying to preserve life to the point that they were reversing extinctions, and Hounds of Tindalos were emerging in response to their screwing around in time. The other main antagonistic factions were Modrons (trying to restore Order and so at cross-purposes with anyone on Team Flumph) and time-travelling Kobolds from the Great and Bountiful Kobold Empire that ruled the world thousands of years hence, and had pinpointed a key moment in history that enabled their rise, which had something to do with the players' activities. There was also a literal Spirit of Extinction which demanded balance; a player could keep their dodo so long as some other species went extinct -- lots of opportunity for "oops, I sort of wiped out the gnomes" developments). It was a weird one, honestly.
DeleteHothouse by Brian Aldiss sorta hits the "Dying Earth, Dying Moon" theme, though by way of a hyper-fecundity. The moon is green, held in place by the webs of miles-long vegetable spiders, and can be reached but the "easy" way to do so is extremely dangerous and possibly even mutagenic. Who knows what creatures and even cultures have developed up there? Even if they originally came from Earth, the cosmic rays could have left them very different.
ReplyDeleteYes, I've heard of that but not read it. I like Aldiss.
DeleteApologies in advance if I'm wrong, but did you use ChatGPT to name this post and How Do You Solve (...)?
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't use it.
DeleteThe pallid, coralline gardens and laboratories of the Fair Folk. The Fae themselves, ashen, luminous, and moth-winged, and their insectoid Selenite servants.
ReplyDeletehttps://sorcerersskull.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-fae-moon.html
Nice!
DeleteA slight variation on your Dying Earth, Dying moon story: the Earth began dying but the moon was OK for a while. Now it's hard times on the moon too and the degens from Earth have found some way to get to the moon and are attacking/invading in waves. Can the moon folk survive? Can they mount a counter-offensive and destroy the Earth once and for all or should they avoid doing so because Earth harbors the artifacts that would mean salvation for both worlds?
ReplyDelete