Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Gaming Inspiration in the News: Medieval Lead Coffin?

Nope, nothing about this is creepy at all. Not one bit. Where's the crowbar?
 
You know how they found Richard III's remains not too long ago, right? Well, apparently, they discovered another stone coffin at the site, and found a lead coffin inside that outer coffin.
 
The following stuck out for me:
 
"None of us in the team have ever seen a lead coffin within a stone coffin before," archaeologist Mathew Morris, the Grey Friars site director, said in a statement. "We will now need to work out how to open it safely, as we don't want to damage the contents when we are opening the lid."
 
OK, is it just me, or does anyone else out there read that and automatically think: "DO NOT open that lead coffin!! Guys, if none of the experts have ever seen a lead coffin from the Middle Ages before, doesn't that suggest that there's something ODD about the whole thing? Sure, let's crack that sucker open post-haste! Great idea, that.
 
This got me to thinking about how to use this during a campaign. Perhaps the use of lead was vital to keeping SOMETHING contained. Perhaps opening that coffin would release that SOMETHING to plague the world once more. Not the most original idea in the realms of fantasy fiction or fantasy gaming, I suppose, but usually a perennial favorite (and one that, if done sparingly, doesn't get old).

2 comments:

  1. Lead blocks magical divination and detection, so you can't determine what's in there without opening it. Or, it helps to insure that whatever is in there can't be located and found (and freed, presumably), under any circumstances, ever.

    What's not to keep a sensible delver from tearing right into it?---leads so soft their daggers can probably get the thing open in a round or two ;)

    Allan.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It isn't just you. Halfway through the quote, I was thinking "Don't open the coffin!" Then I read the part where you said the same thing.

    ReplyDelete