The_Universe
First Post
This thread actually flows directly out of TarrasqueWrangler's Supernatural Experiences thread, which was (ostensibly) to provide ideas for a D20 Modern campaign. The varied experiences of the people posting to that thread have led me to wonder a bit about the local legends of the places where the people who frequent this board are from, and/or the urban legends that we've all been exposed to. Part of this is just my curiosity, but like Tarrasque Wrangler, I may try to mine this stuff for ideas for D20 Modern, or perhaps something a little more "realistic" using normal D&D rules. I'm American, and so I know several American "legends" (like bigfoot, etc.), but I'd really like to get a feel for all the things that people whisper about across the world...not necessarily the things that we're sure are real, but the things that we are afraid might be.
I'll start.
I went to college in a little town in South Dakota, twenty miles south of which was a mound that had once been a sacred site to the Lakota Sioux tribes that had once lived in the area. "Spirit Mound" has several legends attached to it--some old, some not.
When Lewis and Clark came past the mound (which was then visible from the Missouri River) they noted that it did not appear to be a natural hill (there is debate as to whether it is a natural formation, or not--the prevailing thought is that it is a man-made mound...there are similar ones in Ohio). The native americans they met a short time later warned them several times to stay away from the mound, as it was the home of malicious spirits. Tiny dark men would often journey out of the hole in the earth beneath the mound, and would attack brave sioux warriors, sometimes making them go to sleep, and then carting off one of them, taking him back into the hole in the earth from whence they came.
The description of the "little dark men" is actually a lot like the standard D&D drow, right down to the effective sleep poison.
Lewis and Clark did not contact these "little dark men" but several of the other men in the expedition reported seeing them (and being terrified) on the nights that they camped beneath the shadow of the mound.
In the present day, people often report seeing eerie lights floating above the mound, sometimes like a ghostly procession of some sort, other times the description is more akin to a UFO sighting (the lights move really fast, and then shoot up into the sky). A cattle feedlot is directly adjacent to the sight of the mound (which is now owned by the state) and the whispers of the locals would have it that on the nights when you can see the lights over the mound, the feedlot will have several cattle dead the next day, with no apparent cause of death...
I'll start.
I went to college in a little town in South Dakota, twenty miles south of which was a mound that had once been a sacred site to the Lakota Sioux tribes that had once lived in the area. "Spirit Mound" has several legends attached to it--some old, some not.
When Lewis and Clark came past the mound (which was then visible from the Missouri River) they noted that it did not appear to be a natural hill (there is debate as to whether it is a natural formation, or not--the prevailing thought is that it is a man-made mound...there are similar ones in Ohio). The native americans they met a short time later warned them several times to stay away from the mound, as it was the home of malicious spirits. Tiny dark men would often journey out of the hole in the earth beneath the mound, and would attack brave sioux warriors, sometimes making them go to sleep, and then carting off one of them, taking him back into the hole in the earth from whence they came.
The description of the "little dark men" is actually a lot like the standard D&D drow, right down to the effective sleep poison.
Lewis and Clark did not contact these "little dark men" but several of the other men in the expedition reported seeing them (and being terrified) on the nights that they camped beneath the shadow of the mound.
In the present day, people often report seeing eerie lights floating above the mound, sometimes like a ghostly procession of some sort, other times the description is more akin to a UFO sighting (the lights move really fast, and then shoot up into the sky). A cattle feedlot is directly adjacent to the sight of the mound (which is now owned by the state) and the whispers of the locals would have it that on the nights when you can see the lights over the mound, the feedlot will have several cattle dead the next day, with no apparent cause of death...
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