Typically consisting of a 13” x 17” x 19” triangular playing board with one set of 11 pieces and an opposing set of 37 pieces. Material for the pieces and the board vary depending on the age of the game and the culture, which produced it. Wood, bone, stone, ivory, precious metals are all possibilities. Rumours of playing pieces created from mummified human flesh, bones and organs are more likely (but not necessarily) to be a reflection of the game’s scandalous reputation than actual fact.

The playing area is formed of a chaotic and haphazard pattern of geometric and non- geometric shapes. The shapes are delineated in a mad conglomeration of colours and materials with no regard for logic or symmetry.

The pieces can range from simple pebbles to samples created in ivory gold and silver, intricately cast or carved and depicting what appear to be demons or malformed monstrosities. Some sets may depict with greater clarity individual mythos races and or entities.


History

The earliest recorded reference to the game appears in a Chinese manuscript by the historian Wu Fan in 627 BC wherein he records “...merchants have brought this abominable pastime from the mountains of the far north. Already local officials have petitioned the Emperor to forbid on pain of death those indulging in this vice, and to authorise the destruction of all boards and the punishment of those manufacturing or possessing the same…”

However archaeological evidence from sites as geographically distant as Lapland, Belize, Morocco, Laos and New Guinea offer a tantalising possibility that many ancient, and indeed pre-historic cultures had knowledge of the game. Whilst it is possible that every culture passes through similar stages of development, and thus the small statuettes found in all these locations are indeed prehistoric gods specific to the culture, which created them, and may not be pieces for a board game, which apparently transcended prehistoric geographical and cultural boundaries.

It is noteworthy that these strikingly similar artefacts are always recovered from archaeological strata contemporaneous with evidence of strife, famine, and in some cases complete collapse of the culture, which created them.

The game was known in both ancient India and Persia, presumably carried west along the Silk Route from its unknown origins in the North of China. Certainly the Roman commentator Asinius Pollio the Younger had cause to comment on it by the second Century AD following a scandalous murder and subsequent trial in the town of Misenum:

“…The brother of the accused man declared on oath that the man himself was not of sound mind, having devoted himself to the game known as “The Journey of the Mage” for every waking hour for the past month. Under torture the house slaves confessed that their master had at first neglected the affairs of the estate, and ultimately even food and drink, and that he had paused from his deliberation of the board only to consort with those fortune tellers, witches, sorcerers and black magicians to whom he had given the free run of his estate, and at their behest carried out such infamies and depravities in order, so they were told and so they believed, that his skill at the game would increase, and thus please more greatly the infernal gods in whose honour this detestable game is said to be played…”

The Dark Ages saw references to the game all but disappear from recorded history, although there is an intriguing comment in Ghillibert Friesole’s history of the Danish Royal family (circa 875AD) that in the summer of 739AD
“…Two thegns were impaled at the kings command for playing the Game of the Mage, shown unto them by the Greek Trader, and in doing so fell to acts both foul and unnatural…”

It would appear that Ghillibert had more to say on the matter but the following pages of the last surviving edition of his history have been carefully excised – possibly by one of the monks at the Abby at Cluny where the book eventually found its home.

There are at least three known references to the game in the High Middle Ages, when the clergy’s obsession with witchcraft and heresy caused highly detailed records of “evidence” gathered for prosecution of witchcraft cases to be committed to paper.

In 1382 Jean d'Anges recorded that a board ” ...and divers pieces for the damn'd game of the Mages" had been seized and presented as evidence in a witchcraft trial in Rouen. A woodcut accompanying the account depicts a bearded wizard playing the game with a horned and cloven-hoofed Satan. Although the triangular depiction of the board is correct, the conventional chequer board pattern of black and white squares is not. This woodcut probably gave rise to the popular name of the game -"Devil's Chess".

The most detailed account of the game comes from Wilhelm von Hess, whose fifteenth century gazetteer of all things related to the black arts "In Namen Den Teufel", (Cologne 1464) gives a full description of the board, the pieces, the method of play and the effects of playing the game on the trained and untrained mind alike. It is almost certain that Von Hess had seen the board and pieces, and conversed with someone who had actually played the game. Only one copy of Von Hess' unexpurgated work remains extant, in the Kunst Museum in Hanover. It is no co-incidence that the pages describing the board and the game itself were amongst those excised by the Papal censor prior to the publication of later copies of the work. It may be that the Vatican retains records of the information, which was removed by the censor.

By the end of the Middle Ages the game had passed firmly into folklore, becoming a clichéd object within the wizard’s paraphernalia. At the time of the Rosicrucian craze which swept Europe in the mid sixteenth century Henri Soutoit used imagery from the game to describe the passing of the old order and the coming new Kingdom of the Rosy Cross. Characters from his play "The Tower and the Garden" (Paris 1654) mix imagery from chess and The Journeyof the Mage - imagery which Soutoit doubtless borrowed from Von Hess' description of the game:

"Fortunato: This land, guarded at its extents by high towers, blessed by holy prelates, shall never fall to thee. The loyal knights of the king, his brave foot soldiers, all will lay down their life for him. Their advance is unstoppable. Even his royal Lady shall take the field on his behalf and crush thy rebellion underfoot.

Albano: Fool! What you think of as black and white are no more than shades of grey. The straight paths your armies take are not the paths the Mage doth travel...

The Mage has completed his journey and all are subordinate to his will. His Servants are summoned and haste to his bidding. The Black Stones are formed in the pattern decreed… The Mage is united with the Flame and the All Seeing Eye. The Sleeper is wak'nd in the deep, as the stars turn overhead. The petty games of men are overthrown as all boards are overturned in a universal destruction..."

From the age of Enlightenment serious references to the game vanish, although it is claimed that the late Victorian medium and spiritualist Henry Abercrombie commissioned a board and pieces based on specimens recovered from a tomb excavation in Karnack in 1847. Whether Abercrombie ever actually committed either his interpretation of the rules or his experiences with the game to paper remains open to debate.

In more recent times is tempting to speculate that Herman Hesse had the game in mind when he wrote “The Glass Bead Game”. Certainly the rigorous intellectual and aesthetic exercise, which formed Hess’s conception are an essential component of “The Journey of the Mage”.


SPELLS

It is certain that the game was never intended to be played in isolation from other esoteric studies that the player may be undertaking. From Von Hess’ description it is clear that the very act of setting out the pieces represents a considerable intellectual exercise. Although the opening positions of chess are clearly defined, and the maximum number of moves possible in say the first three turns are mathematically circumscribed, this is not the case with “The Journey of the Mage”. The player must first have in his mind an expectation of a specific outcome either intellectual, spiritual or magical. Wanting to “win” is not enough, and in the broader scope of the game a meaningless concept. He then manipulates his pieces on the geometric and non- geometric haphazardly positioned shapes which form the boards playing area to reflect the interplay of differing cosmic forces which his studies, and/or intuition suggest will provide the desired effect.

Should the initial set up of the pieces prove successful the player gains a clarity of vision and heightened intellectual prowess- in effect the player has cast “Keenness of Two Alike” upon himself. The effect of casting this spell through use of the Board of “Journey of the Mage” will last for 1D3 days, rather than the 1D6+3 hours specified in the description of the spell in the 5th edition rules.

It is at this point that the game offers the greatest danger to the initiate, or those untrained in operational magic. The temptation is to continue the game and to move the pieces into new and more complex patterns. In doing so the player begins to manipulate cosmic forces, which he cannot begin to understand. In a short while the player becomes obsessed, and as new patterns form on the board before him he stops playing the game and the game begins to play him.

Starting with the first time he arranges more than 3 pieces on the board, and once a day thereafter, each day the player must roll his POW or less to break away from the board. Failure means he is compelled to play on, blindly shifting the pieces and haphazardly forming more intricate and potentially dangerous patterns on the board. There is a 1D4 SAN loss per day the player is compelled to play, plus STR and CON losses as the keeper sees fit as food, drink and basic hygiene are forgotten.

The player begins to receive instructions and visions through the board – visions that may compel him to perform increasingly blasphemous, depraved, violent and ultimately murderous acts. Once the instruction has been given and acted upon the player quickly returns to the board to see what new patterns these vile deeds now inspire him to form.

Such acts in and of themselves may cost SAN, but it is more likely that they are merely precursors to the unhinged player forming those patterns on the board, which will bring forth horrors from beyond.
For each day of play roll 1D10 and multiply the result by 10 – this gives the percentage chance that the player has formed a pattern on the board, which will summon forth …whatever the keeper chooses.
(It is equally possible that the player may unwittingly open a portal and simply disappear –goodness knows where.)

For PCs and weak NPC cultists this should be as far as they could get with the game –summoning (and not necessarily binding) a servitor race through the board –with all the concomitant SAN losses such a being brings with it.

For more powerful NPCs – ranking cultists and sorcerers- the game is played with the aim of heightening intellectual prowess, assisting in their magical operations and discerning those alignments of cosmic forces which best serve their foul needs. Such players never play the game without the necessary reference works – powerful mythos tomes –to interpret and control the outcome of their moves. In some cases they may have a minion or underling move the pieces for them. They gain deep insights into the Mythos and understanding of unseen forces. They may contemplate, meditate and research for weeks or months before moving a single piece into a new position. They then spend an equal length of time contemplating and digesting the effects of this move before beginning the process anew with the next piece.

Predictions, prophecies, the altering of natural laws and great summonings and commandings are all possibilities for experts in the game who play at the highest levels.

However even as they play at theses rarefied intellectual heights there remains the danger that they will make a wrong move, and summon forth one of the greater mythos deities – resulting in their own destruction and that of much of their immediate surroundings.